Bill balm for contractors

​Hyderabad: Almost after three months embargo on the clearance of long pending bills during the elections between September and December, the State government decided to release payments to the long waiting contractors from Thursday onwards.

The Finance department on Tuesday decided to clear the bills following the pleas from the agencies for the clearance of the bills. Nearly Rs 5,000 crore bills from Roads and Buildings department alone were pending before the government. Another Rs 5,000 crore are pending from all other departments for payments to contractors. However, the State government is managing the clearance of bills of irrigation contractors in a timely manner with the support of external funding from banks particularly.

The representatives of contract agencies on Tuesday thronged State Finance Secretary K Ramakrishna Rao and Deputy Secretaries chambers and urged the officials for immediate clearance of the bills. Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao entrusted State finance department the big responsibility of judicious utilisation of the funds in the 2018-19 financial year. Rythu Bandhu scheme, for which the government earmarked Rs 12,000 crore put heavy financial burden on the state exchequer. As a result, many bills were pending for the last six months.

Officials said that the clearance of bills would be taken in a staged-wise manner from Thursday onwards. Pending bills up to Rs 5 crore will be cleared on a priority basis and based on the availability of funds the other hefty bills will be disposed. Government targeted to clear all pending bills before the end of this financial year in view of the increased requirement of funds to implement the new promises like hike in pension amount under the social security schemes and filling up of vacancies in government departments, a senior official added.