When Chief Minister Pramod Sawant, will rise to present the State Budget today, he would know that the conditions are anything but ideal “ the tax revenue is not growing at a significant rate, the government is borrowing heavily, hardly any industrial reforms have taken place and mining and tourism are going through their worst phase. All eyes will be on the CM to see whether he will rise to the occasion and present a bold budget or whether he will just pay lip service to all the economic problems of the State.
Realistically speaking, there is little or nothing that Sawant can do to improve the situation with either mining or tourism in the short run. What else can he do then? Several kinds of manufacturing are happening in the industrial estates. Such industrialists have made representations to the government time and again. However, very little has improved for them on the ground in close to the last three years of the current State Government. This is the area, which is totally within Sawant’s control and this is where he should try his level best to give a boost.
Industrialists are still making rounds of government departments to get all the approvals. Ironically, for the last six years, the government has been working on improving ease of doing business. The Investment Promotion Board (IPB) is still not a single window clearance system. Goa Industrial Development Corporation (GIDC), which controls all the industrial estates, has no large plots left. Hardly any large industry has set its base in Goa in the last 3 years. The CM must hold GIDC accountable.
GIDC must be asked whether it is sure that each and every industrial plot in the State is optimally utilized or not. Large companies are willing to move to Goa predominantly because the State offers better work-life balance than any other part of India. But how can they move if there’s no industrial land in the State? Just like a CEO does in a private company, the CM must give targets to IPB, GIDC, Directorate of Industries and Factories and Boilers on reform implementation.
Another area which is begging Sawant’s intervention is: Chimbel IT Park and Tuem ESDM Park. Once and for all, the CM must assure all the stakeholders concerned that both these projects are for the welfare of the people of Goa. While steps were taken to move forward on Chimbel IT Park, Tuem ESDM Park seems to have fallen off the government’s priority list. CM must give clear targets to the IT Department for implementation of these projects.
These are the challenges Sawant faces today. To make matters worse, there is a grim fiscal situation that he is facing. However, if he wants to take Goa forward, he’ll have to take risks and present a bold budget.
