Lucknow: Keeping 2022 Assembly polls in mind, the Yogi Adityanath government in Uttar Pradesh tabled its first supplementary budget for the current financial year. The size of supplementary budget is of Rs 7301 crore with major allocation of Rs 3000 crore for youth. This huge amount has been provided to make youths digitally capable. The state government has allocated funds for expressways, developmental projects of Ayodhya and Varanasi.
In the supplementary budget, Rs 100 crore have been provided for the Bundelkhand expressway while Rs 50 crore for the link road of Balia district. The long pending demand of increasing honorarium of the contractual employees has been fulfilled with the state government making budgetary allocations for it. To address the problem of stray animals in the state, which has been posing threat to agriculture, the state government has allocated Rs 300 crore. This amount would be used to handle the problem of stray animals.
The state finance minister Suresh Kumar Khanna while tabling the supplementary budget in the assembly on Wednesday said that honorarium of Asha workers, Anganwadi workers, PRD jawans, village chowkidars, Shiksha Mitra and various others has been increased and funds have been given for it. He said that Rs 200 crore has been provided for making payment of cane arrears to the farmers due on the sugar mills of the co-operative sector. The supplementary budget has provided Rs two crore for giving cash reward to those who won medals in Tokyo Olympics. For the Swachh Bharat Mission, the state government has provided Rs 200 crore in the supplementary budget. The supplementary budget has provision of Rs 40 crore for the construction of roads in Kashi-Vishwanath corridor at Varanasi. For the parking lots and public utility services in Ayodhya, Rs 209 crore has been provided.
While tabling the supplementary budget, state finance minister said that Rs 50 crore has been provided for construction of Ambedkar Memorial and culture centre in Lucknow. Recently the President of India, Ram Nath Kovind had laid foundation of it. On petrol and diesel prices, finance minister said that compared to other states the VAT in UP is less. He said that the money allocated for making the youths of UP digitally equipped would be utilized to provide them training and necessary things.
Meanwhile, Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) Chief Mayawati termed the supplementary budget as disappointing and said that promises made by the BJP government remained only on paper. The spokesperson of Congress, Mukesh Singh Chauhan, said that the state government could not utilize the annual budget properly and hence there was no need for a supplementary.
