The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) is a significant financial committee of the legislative Assembly and it has an important task of keeping financial control on administration, said Speaker of Chhattisgarh legislative Assembly Gaurishankar Agrawal while chairing the first meeting of PAC (for fiscal 2016-17) here on Tuesday.
“The prime work of PAC is to monitor the implementation of the announcements made in the budget passed by the legislative Assembly for the schemes for which funds had been allocated. The committee has also to observe the useless expenditures or financial irregularities in those works,” the Speaker said.
According to the Speaker, committees are a smaller forms of Assembly and it is through these committees in the parliamentary democracy the ‘accountability of executive towards legislature’ is ensured.
“The Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) presents its report on expenditure and deficiencies in spending performed by the administration in union territories and table of legislative assemblies of states,” he said.
Detailing about responsibilities of PAC, the Speaker said: "CAG examines annual accounts of the administration and sees that the funds earmarked for any head is being used for the same purpose or not. The committee monitors whether rules/procedures were followed by the concerned department or not. Effective steps were taken or not for getting revenue receipts".
During the meeting, Chairman of Estimation Committee Devjibhai Patel, Bhupesh Baghel, Gurumukh Singh Hora, Naveen Markandey, Principal Secretary of Chhattisgarh Assembly Devendra Verma, Deputy CAG of Chhattisgarh K Sai Shankar and others were also present.