Satisfied over the declined fiscal deficit number for 2012-13, Finance Minister P Chidambaram said, the government will focus on raising revenues to bring down deficit to below 4.8 percent of GDP in the current financial year. However, the minister is not wishing to compress the expenditure and attributed the decline in fiscal deficit from revised estimate of 5.2 percent to about 4.9 percent of GDP, to the higher non-tax revenue and savings on expenditure side.
The government had budgeted revenue realization for FY13 fiscal at Rs 10.38 lakh crore in which direct tax collection was estimated at over Rs 5.65 lakh crore and around Rs 4.69 lakh crore came from indirect taxes. Meanwhile, government’s total expenditure was pegged at Rs 14.30 lakh crore. Further, non-tax revenues were higher by about Rs 8,000-10,000 crore besides savings on plan expenditure to the tune of Rs 6,000 crore, in previous fiscal.
Meanwhile, the government is committed to contain the fiscal deficit and in budget had proposed to lower fiscal deficit to 4.8 percent of GDP in FY14 and reduce it gradually to 3 percent by FY17. Earlier, the finance minister had said that fiscal deficit target is a red line that would never be breached and expressed confidence that the revenue target for 2013-14 financial year would be achieved as the GDP growth is likely to be over 6 percent.