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Supplementary grants get the nod

The Lok Sabha Monday okayed supplementary grants for 1997-98.

Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha said the government was determined to check the fiscal deficit at 5.6 per cent despite a difficult financial situation.

His ministry has been ''extremely strict'' with the government about the demand for additional resources. ''My stand is that those who are asking for additional resources should locate the matching resources. A strict discipline to minimise the cash outflow of Rs 13 billion is being maintained,'' he said.

The fiscal deficit was a matter of ''utmost concern.'' It reflected the nation's health. The country has been facing ''an intractable problem'' for the past two decades, the finance minister continued, pointing out that the fiscal deficit averaged 6.2 per cent of the gross domestic product during 1980-85. The next five years saw it rise to 8.2 per cent, with a peak of 9 per cent in 1986-87.

Sinha said when the P V Narasimha Rao government introduced liberalisation policies in 1991, the fiscal deficit was 8.6 per cent. And the average between 1991-92 and 1995-96 period was 6.1 per cent.

During the United Front government's tenure, this deficit was one of the lowest in many years - just 5.2 per cent. But the very next year it jumped to 6.1 per cent against a target of 4.3 per cent.

Asserting his target was 5.6 per cent, Sinha sought the co-operation of the House in tackling this problem.

Despite bad weather and frequent natural calamities, the finance minister expressed the hope that agriculture production would register 3 to 4 per cent growth, and that the overall economic growth would be around six per cent.

Referring to the economic sanctions, Sinha said the country has ''weathered'' the storm.

UNI

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