For the sake of formality?

Demand for various ministries in Government of India totaling Rs.1,257,728 crore without the scrutiny of Standing Committees that normally examine departmental proposals and allocations have been passed in the budget session of Parliament on March 5, 2011 mainly due to elections scheduled in 4 states and 1 Union Territory in April-May. We very well understand that even after the detailed scrutiny of the departmental proposals, several hundred crores of rupees are normally found to be misspent or under-utilized by different departments. Under these circumstances demands worth Rs1.2 billion are passed for expenditure without any examination. God knows how much will be utilized and with what justification. The way the Public Accounts Committee of the same Parliament finds several loopholes in implementation of the projects by various Ministries one is sure that many of the departmental proposals may not have been properly formulated and kept for implementation during the financial year 2011-12. The Parliament and the Standing Committee are supposed to go through the proposals in detail before the demands are passed by the full house in the form of a Finance Bill. It is a pity that public representatives even after spending crores of rupees on travels and sittings are unable to scrutinize the budget proposals and guide the Ministries or the departments for fully utilizing the provisions given in the budget. As an insider has pointed out, hardly any department or ministry is in a position to release the budget allocation to the proper beneficiary including the State Governments without any illegal cut. Several lobbyists and the beneficiaries are quite manipulative in getting the allocation made, proposals sanctioned and funds released within a few days despite owlish eyes and regulatory mechanism in place on paper.