Delhi govt''s social sector-oriented budget-Mar 22,2011

Delhi govt''s social sector-oriented budget

PTI | 09:03 PM,Mar 22,2011

New Delhi, Mar 22 (PTI) The Delhi government's budget for 2011-12 today gave a major push to the social sector hiking allocations for various welfare schemes and made bicycles, kerosene stoves and sanitary napkins cheaper while sweetmeats, diesel-run vehicles, tobacco products and furnishings will be costlier. In the Rs 27,067-crore budget, the transport sector got the highest allocation of Rs 3,348 crore, followed by Rs 1,802 crore for health sector while education has been given Rs 1,247 crore. Chief Minister Shiela Dikshit, presenting her first budget in 12 years at the helm, unveiled an ambitious universal free health facility which will cover nearly 27 lakh school going children upto the age of 14 years and an initial corpus of Rs 100 crore has been proposed in the budget for this. Dikshit also set aside Rs 405 crore for construction of houses for economically weaker sections while earmarking Rs 180 crore for improving civic amenities in slum clusters. The Chief Minister proposed an amount of Rs 698 crore for development work in over 1,200 unauthorised colonies and announced enhanced monthly emoluments for Anganwadi workers. She also announced exempting kerosene stoves, lanterns and petromax lamps and their spares from VAT. A VAT of 12.5 per cent would, however, be imposed on unmanufactured tobacco, making all tobacco products including bidis and hookah smoking more expensive. 'Khandsari' sugar and textiles have also been exempted from VAT. Sanitary napkins costing upto Rs 20 have also been exempted from VAT. In her tax proposals, Dikshit, known for her eco-friendly initiatives, proposed levying an additional tax of 25 per cent on existing tax rates on all diesel-propelled vehicles to "discourage people from buying diesel vehicles" while Value Added Tax on bicycles having an MRP of upto Rs 3,500 has been removed. The budget increased the VAT on sweetmeats and 'namkeen' to 12.5 per cent from existing five per cent to discourage people from having "unhealthy eating habits". "We are particularly concerned about the growing incidence of lifestyle diseases among Delhi's citizens.Diabetes and hypertension are some of the unfortunate byproducts of our city life and unhealthy eating habits, even among our children, need to be addressed," Dikshit said. She proposed Rs 13,600 crore as planned outlay and Rs 13,307 crore will be non-plan expenditure.