The Arvind Kejriwal Government is planning to increase the annual financial powers for sanctioning of new projects from Rs5 crore to Rs10 crore. The officers can utilise the money subject to the availability of the funds for launching new projects. But the financial powers for sanctioning new projects to the HODs has not been increased. At present, the HODs have the powers to spend Rs2 crore every year on new projects. This means Principal Secretaries/ Secretaries may use upto Rs10 crore to execute day-to-day functioning and needs of their department.
Top sources told The Pioneer that Kejriwal Government is also going to propose to increase the annual ‘contingency expenditure’ of its administrative secretaries from Rs3 lakh to Rs5 lakh and those of its HODs from Rs2 lakh to Rs3 lakh.
The ‘contingency expenditure’ is generally spent on the purchase of day-to-day items like printing of visiting cards, rubber seals, notepads, purchase of files and other stationary. Even the annual conveyance allowance of all the officers is likely to be increased from Rs30,000 to Rs1 lakh per annum.
In another development, the Government is also going to increase the financial powers of its administrative secretaries for carrying out minor repairs from Rs5 lakh to Rs7 lakh per annum. But the amount for carrying out small repairs by the HODs has been increased to Rs1 lakh per annum.
Sources further said that the Government was planning to increase the ‘contingency expenditure’ to reduce paper work and put to effective use the hundreds of man-hours wasted in getting sanctions for routine works.