The Hemant Soren Government, backed by the Congress and the RJD, is on a spree of offering freebies involving thousands of crores ahead of the Assembly elections with a view to wooing the voters.
A flurry of announcements has been made during the last one month (see box) and more such sops are on the cards before the Election Commission imposes the Model Code of conduct likely in a week's time.
Incidentally, the Opposition is also silent on the State Government's slew of populist announcements fearing backlash from the electorate. "Most of the announcements are not likely to be implemented during the Soren Government's tenure, and they will certainly leave a big liability for the future Government," commented a senior bureaucrat.
It is not that the ruling coalition is oblivious of the fact. "We also know that the incumbent Government will not be able to implement the promises, but we could have at least some issues if the next Government reverses any of our decisions," pointed out a JMM leader.
But the officialdom feared that the promises made by the Government are the recipe for messing up the State's economy further.
"It is quite ironical that the State government has made announcement to spend a huge amount of the tax payers' money when there has been no systematic effort to augment our internal resources. We have witnessed only doles and exemptions so far," he maintained.
A senior finance department official pointed out that there was Rs 2,400 crore funds in the public exchequer a month back. "But how the populist announcements, which will have long term impact on our economy, will be implemented without any additional resources," he pointed out.
The official pointed out that the three major departments - excise, transport and forest - contributing to the internal resources, have miserably failed. "We are not able to meet our target from the excise revenue of Rs 700 crore, which is far below the Bihar target of Rs 1,100 crore. Jharkhand forest cover equals that of Madhya Pradesh, but what we get from the forests is just a peanut. MP earns Rs 1,200 crore forest revenue," he pointed out.
Though the Government brags it as one of its achievements, but the decision to hike scholarship to SC/ST/OBC students from Class I to VIII by 233 percent is also being questioned. There is no logic behind such doles when the Government is providing everything free to Class 1-VIII students.
The pension to minority school teachers has also raised the eyebrows. "When the Government has stopped giving pensions to its employees appointed after 2004 how come the teachers of minority schools, that too not regulated by the Government, should get pensionIJ" asked an official.
The Government has also failed to explore options to generate revenues. To cite an example, while there is a concerted effort to relax police station boundary for the transfer of tribal land, a move set to benefit cash-rich tribal politicians and bureaucrats only, there is no move to get commercial land rent from those who have acquired agricultural land for industrial purposes.
Former Chief Minister Arjun Munda was acerbic. "The Soren government is in illusion that such freebies would not get votes. It has failed to understand the changing demography of the electorates, who want jobs and rapid growth instead of freebies," he maintained. BJP MP and a financial expert Jayant Sinha too agreed. "How could the Government go on announcing freebies when its kitty is emptyIJ," he asked.
He said that Jharkhand has to repay Rs 3,191 crore loan in the next five years. "The contribution to the budget from the internal resources is decreasing every year. While Chhattisgarh has fixed a target of 57 percent revenue from its own internal resources, Jharkhand has fixed it merely at 43 percent," he pointed out.