Tribune News Service
Ruchika M Khanna
Chandigarh, August 28
The Punjab government has reduced the discretionary grant of the Chief Minister from Rs 50 crore to Rs 37 crore and that of all its ministers from Rs 1.5 crore per annum to Rs 1 crore per annum.
The discretionary grant of the Punjab Vidhan Sabha Speaker, too, has been reduced from Rs 1.5 crore to Rs 1 crore.
The decisions were taken in the Punjab cabinet led by Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann here on Monday afternoon.
Finance Minister Harpal Cheema said the decision to reduce the grants was taken as the panchayats across the state had a lot of unused funds, given to them by the 15th Finance Commission.
“We want that these funds be used for the development works, rather than using the discretionary funds of ministers,” he said.
This is the second time during this calendar year that the discretionary grants of the ministers have been reduced. In January, the discretionary grants of cabinet ministers were reduced from Rs 3 crore (given during the Congress government) to Rs 1.5 crore. During the initial days of the Congress rule, the ministers used to get Rs 5 crore as discretionary grant. The discretionary grant of the Chief Minister was then fixed at Rs 50 crore.
The other decisions taken by the cabinet are: premature release of four prisoners; creation of 20 posts in Governance Reforms department; and approval to fill 484 posts in the Punjab Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences at Mohali.
