Last Updated on February 26, 2021 at 10:48 am
It has now come to the fore that the J&K administration lost Rs 843 crore caused by failure of the erstwhile PDP led government to retrieve loans from various corporations and entities.
Institutions like Jammu and Kashmir Power Development Corporation, Srinagar Development Authority and many others surfaced as major defaulters in the entire process. Documents reveal that from 2013-14 to 2017-18, the amount of total outstanding loans increased from Rs 1,409.83 crore to Rs 1,660.86 crore during the period.
A major portion of these unrecovered loans were given to seven entities:
- Municipalities Rs 5.17 crore (Nil recovery)
- Development Authority, Srinagar – Rs 1.91 crore (Nil recovery)
- Public Sector and other Undertakings (J&K, HPMC Ltd) – Rs 12.66 crore (Nil recovery)
- Electricity Board, JKPDC – Rs. 85.04 crore (Nil recovery)
- Agro Industries – Rs 7.94 crore (Nil recovery)
- J&K Industries Ltd – Rs 383.98 crore (Rs 2.50 crore recovered)
- Jammu and Kashmir State Road Transport Corporation Limited – Rs 3,46.72 crore (Nil recovery)
Against the unpaid amount of Rs 843.44 crore, Rs 2.50 crore were only retrieved during 2017-18. Records reveal that there were unsettled loans of Rs 373.19 crore against J&K Industries Ltd as of March 2017. Even when this amount was not recovered, the State Government approved a new loan of Rs 13.29 crore and recovered only Rs 2.50 crore during 2017-18.
The State Government granted loans without caring about the recovery of previous loans. The reason behind this “benevolent” nature of the government remains unknown. The government received internal debt of Rs 25,526 crore including Market Loans of Rs 6,200 crore, loan of financial institutions and banks amounting Rs 668 crore during 2017-18 which was Rs 4,802 crore (23 per cent) more than internal debt receipt of Rs 20,724 crore of the previous year.
Records reveal that the Public Accounts Receipts reduced from Rs 35,983 crore in 2016-17 to Rs 30,697 crore, disbursements also reduced from 33,586 crore in 2016-17 to 30,861 crore in 2017-18 mainly because of less receipt/disbursement under remittances in comparison to the previous year. In 2016-17, the excess of receipts over disbursement was Rs 2,397 crore and it went down to minus Rs 164 crore in 2017-18 because of excess disbursement of remittance over receipts during 2017-18.
