21 hours Ago By Sentinel Digital Desk
Staff Reporter The state government has started preparations for the state budget for FY 2025-26, and the Finance Department has asked all administrative departments to submit budget estimates to the Finance Department by January 30, 2025. This will be the last full-fledged budget by the Chief Minister -led government, with the Assembly elections due to be held around April 2025, and it will be a crucial budget for the present government. Major announcements are expected in this budget.
Regarding the preparation of budget estimates, in respect of receipts and expenditures of the Government of Assam for general and Sixth Schedule areas for FY 2025-26, the Commissioner & Secretary of the Finance Department has written to all additional Chief Secretaries, Principal Secretaries, Commissioner & Secretaries, Secretaries, and all Heads of departments and principal secretaries of the autonomous councils. The letter said, “In continuation to the ongoing reform initiatives of the Finance Department, the budgeting process for FY 2025-26 will also see substantial changes that are aimed at improving budget controls, increasing transparency, the implementation of SNA Sparsh mode for CSS, and proper accounting to capture capex, etc., both on the receipts as well as on the expenditure side.
The key points of the budgeting process for FY 2025-26: (i) The Budget for FY 2025-26 is scheduled to be presented in electronic format; (ii) To maintain a proper revenue balance, it is proposed to curtail unproductive revenue expenditure. While preparing the budget estimates for 2025-26, the senior-most secretaries of the administrative departments must ensure a realistic approach. The estimates should establish a reasonable correlation between the budget estimates for 2025-26, the revised estimates for 2024-25, and the actuals of the financial year 2023-24; (iii) The status of implementation of budget announcements for FY 2023-24 & 2024-25 (as of February 10, 2025) should be updated on the https://finassam.
in portal by February 10, 2025; (iv) The receipt & expenditure estimates are to be submitted by the HoDs on the https://finassam.in portal only. It should be vetted and duly forwarded by the senior-most secretary of the administrative department on the portal to the Finance department.
” The letter further stated that the last date for the submission of estimates by the HoDs to the administrative departments is January 20, 2025, and by the administrative departments to Finance is January 30, 2025. Administrative Departments are also directed to submit their materials in very concise form for the Budget Speech 2025-26 mandatorily in the https://finassam.in portal positively on or before January 30, 2025.
It was also noted that in case of non-submission of estimates within the aforesaid timelines, the Finance Department will prepare the budget estimates for FY 2025-26 using data from FY 2024-25, and no further change will be permitted. The budget session of the Assam Assembly is scheduled to start from the mid part of February, 2025, and the budget is expected to be tabled in the first half of March 2025. Also Read: Also Watch:.
