Karnataka budget 2014-15- Highlights of Siddu's speech

DH team brings you highlights of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah's budget speech.

Fiscal Affairs:

CM seems to have spared the common man of additional tax burdens.  Thanks to the election year. 

Additional excise duty on beer hiked from 122% to 135%. So, that makes your favourite drink more expensive. 

License fee for distilleries and breweries hiked by 50%.

Luxury taxis may become significantly more expensive. Rs 500 to be levied on luxury cabs per seat, per quarter.

Stamp duty exempted for alternative sites by BDA.

Key announcements:

A new policy to buy land for residential sites in rural and urban areas will be implemented.

Motor Vehicles Act to be amended to plug revenue loss from vehicles registered in other states plying on Karnataka roads. But no details on how this will be done. 

Government to set up three 250-bed super speciality hospitals in Mysore, Gulbarga and Belgaum. These would serve critically ill patients.  

Government to set up one medical college in each district in phased manner. Six colleges to come up initially - one each in Tumkur, Haveri, Bagalkot, Yadgir, Chikkaballapur and Chitradurga. 

Kaveri Tourism Authority to be set up to develop Mysore circle (Mysore, Mandya, Chamaraja Nagar and Kodagu districts) 

Incentive to set up 'Janatha Cinema Halls' at district and taluq  HQs to exhibit Kannada films. 

Rs 500 crore to Krishibhagya scheme to improve rainfed agriculture. The scheme will be implemented in 23 districts  to cover 45 lakh hectares.

Rs 1.5 crore for entertainment in old age homes through classical music, folk performances and other traditional art forms such as harikatha. Small money but significant gesture. 

Bangalore

Rs 26,405 crore for the second phase of metro rail.

Development and widening of roads - Rs 300 crore

Development  of footpaths - Rs 100 crore

Development and protection of 31 lakes - Rs 100 crore

Implementation of parking policy - Rs 10 crore

Development of peripheral ring road - Rs 5800 crore

Solid waste management - Rs 100 crore

Development of arterial and sub-arterial roads - Rs 500 crore

Elevated road to be constructed from Chalukya to Hebbal junction.

Elevated road to be constructed from Alisada to Basaveshwara Circle.

BDA to construct 8000 flats.

Applications for 5000 sites in Kempegowda layout to be invited in March.

Education 

Expert committee to prepare text books.

Online computer-aided education to be introduced.

Central university to be set up in Karwar.

Bangalore and Karnataka Virtual University to be set up.

10, 000 students in standards 9 and 10 to be trained in IT, retail and healthcare.

Education Quality Monitoring Cell to be set up.

Allocations for different sectors

Water resources - Rs 11, 349 crore

Education - Rs 21, 305 crore

Energy - Rs 11, 693 crore

Urban Development - Rs 9995 crore

Social welfare - Rs 6475 crore

Women and child welfare - Rs 3670 crore

PWD - Rs 6634 crore

Rural Development - Rs 9361 crore

BBMP - Rs 1527 crore

12:55 pm. We received our copy of the budget speech. So, stopping the minute by minute tracking of the CM's speech. Will bring highlights of the speech. 

12:50 pm. Agricultural growth was at 4.9%, higher than the national avaerage of 4.6%

12:45 pm. State GDP was around 5% in 2013-14.

12:43 pm. BBMP gets total grant of Rs 1527 crore.

12:40 pm. We have provided clean government. We have also met many promises in a short duration.

12:36 pm. Speaker asks CM to start the speech. Siddaramaiah begins presenting his 9th budget.

12:33 pm. CM walks into the Assembly looking relaxed and takes his seat. All set to go.

12.28 pm: Till December 2013, the government had met only about 68 per cent of its tax-revenue target, thanks to the slowdown in the economy. The target was Rs 62,464 crore, while the actual realisation as Rs 42,947 crore.  The coming Lok Sabha elections would prevent him from taking harsh measures to boost revenue.

12.20 pm: The budget will see him walking a tight rope. The government expenditure is ballooning at a time the revenue is shrinking.  Some of the burden is due to the welfare schemes he announced in a hurry when he took charge.

12.15 pm: Though Siddu will present the budget for the full year (2014-15), he will seek legislative sanction to bankroll government expenditure only for the initial four months.