The government on Monday said that it has released the second tranche of compensation payment amounting to Rs 6,000 crore to 16 states and 3 union territories under a special borrowing window. This amount was raised at a weighted average rate of 4.42%.
The government said that the loan would be passed on to the states/UTs at the same interest rate, which is lower than the cost of borrowings for the states and UTs, thus benefitting them. “Ministry of finance has facilitated loans of Rs 12,000 crore till date,” it added.
The Centre is using the special window for borrowing as an alternative method of raising funds for compensating states to the extent of shortfall of GST mop-up from the protected revenue.
The states are constitutionally guaranteed a 14% growth in GST proceeds year-on-year for the first five years or till 2022.
There are 21 states and 3 union territories that have so far agreed to the borrowing scheme under which the loans are raised by central government and are released on a back-to-back basis to states/UTs.
The loans in the second tranche has been released to Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Goa, Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Meghalaya, Odisha, Tamil Nadu, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, union territories of Delhi, Jammu and Kashmir and Puducherry.
The government plans to borrow the same amount every week till it has passed on Rs 1.1 lakh crore to the states and UTs. The amount has been arrived at considering the shortfall of states due to reasons only relating to GST implementation. However, the total shortfall which includes impact of the pandemic is estimated to be Rs 2.35 lakh crore for the fiscal.
At least 9 states continue to oppose the scheme, saying the Centre should borrow to bridge the entire shortfall.
The Centre has said it would try to convince these states to come on board with the existing scheme.
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