Kathmandu, May 28

The government will present the fiscal budget 2017-18 in the Parliament tomorrow with the regular development programmes that have been envisioned by the three year plan (2016-17 to 2018-19).

Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Krishna Bahadur Mahara today briefed President Bidhya Devi Bhandari regarding the budget that he is going to present in the Parliament on Monday.

As the second phase of the local polls is scheduled for June 14, the government has prepared the budget in consultation with the Election Commission and Minister Mahara will be presenting the budget as finance minister of the caretaker government. This is the reason why the budget will not incorporate any new programmes that could influence voters’ sentiment, according to finance ministry sources.

As there are no new programmes, the budget size will not exceed the ceiling of Rs 1,156 billion. The fiscal budget will

revise excise rate on cigarettes and alcohol, among others. It will allocate grant of around Rs 350 billion to the local units, which will directly be transferred to the local bodies.

“Local units will get no less than Rs 100 million each unconditional grant, which they can spend as per their development needs,” a source privy to the budget formulation told The Himalayan Times. “Strengthening the local units is the priority area of fiscal budget 2017-18.”

The fiscal budget will allocate sufficient resources for national pride projects and priority projects. Energy sector development and utilising information and communication technology (ICT) in service delivery by the government are the major priority areas of the fiscal budget 2017-18. The budget has incorporated some programmes to keep the momentum of high growth that the country is expected to achieve in this fiscal.