Tripura Deputy Chief Minister Jishnu Dev Varma on Thursday presented a Rs 26,893 crore tax-free Budget for 2022-23

Tripura Deputy Chief Minister Jishnu Dev Varma on Thursday presented a Rs 26,893 crore tax-free Budget for 2022-23.

In the fifth annual budget of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led coalition government total budget allocation of Rs 26,893 crore in 2022-23 is an increase of 18.34 per cent over the budget of 2021-22.

New schemes which included Tripura Government Health Scheme (Rs 20 Crore), Tripura Start-up Fund (Rs 15 Crore), Khelo Tripura, Susto Tripura to inculcate a habit of healthy lifestyle and to promote sporting activities (Rs 6.50 Crore), Establishment of biofloc units under Mukhyamantri Nibir Matsyachash Prakalpa (Rs. 6 Crore) and Interest Subvention for piggery activities (Rs. 5 Crore) .

Dev Varma, who holds the Finance and Power portfolios, said that no new tax is proposed in the budget.“To make large scale investment in infrastructures, capital expenditure has been doubled to Rs 5285 crore in the budget estimates of 2022-23 from Rs 2651 crore in 2021-22. Allocations in education and health sectors have been increased by 20.66 per cent and 23 per cent respectively,” the Deputy Chief Minister said.

Announcing the retirement age of 13,500 Tripura State Rifles jawans from 57 years to 60 years, Dev Varma said that the monthly social pension of around four lakh poor people would also be enhanced from Rs 1,000 to Rs 2,000 with effect from October this year and an allocation of Rs 645 crore has been earmarked in the budget for the purpose.

Tripura is going to assembly polls next year. The deputy chief minister announced

“Under this mission, the state Government would provide 3 per cent interest subvention for women entrepreneurs and earmark 50 per cent funds for women in venture capital funds being set up by the state government.”

“Despite Covid19 challenge, the state government has responded timely to minimize the adverse impact through multipronged strategies and enabled to secure the growth at 12.16 percent this year,” Dev Varma maintained.

“Giving utmost importance to the education sector, I have allocated Rs 5010 Cr for the coming year, which is 20.66 Crore higher than last year. An amount of Rs 21 Crore has been allocated for establishment of National Law University from next session and an English medium college will be set up in the state in next fiscal,” the minister pointed out.

The budget stated that about 41.19 percent of the total outlay would be incurred towards payment of salaries, wages and pension while a total of 9.38 percent of the expenditure will be made on repayment of loans and interest payment.