Defence allocation rises

[TamilNet, Thursday, 08 October 1998, 11:17 GMT]
The Sri Lankan government's defence expenditure allocation has risen in the 1999 budget to 47 billion rupees (717 million USD), according to figures released in parliament yesterday. At the same time, the amount allocated for the implementation of official languages, 21.2 million rupees (321,000USD), is a significant reduction on the allocation under last year's budget.

Sri Lanka's Acting Deputy Minister of Finance Mr.Ratnasiri Wickramanayaka presented the People's Alliance (PA)'s appropriation bill for 1999 in Parliament yesterday.

According to the bill, the government's expenditure for 1999 is planned to be 241.993 billion rupees (3.65 billion USD) and revenue is expected to be 232.362 billion rupees (3.5 billion USD), resulting in a budget deficit of 9.592 billion rupees.

The defence expenditure in the 1999 budget is set to 47.352 billion rupees. In 1998 allocation it was 44.999 billion originally, although this sum was raised considerably later.

The official languages department has been allocated a mere 21.2 million (321,000 USD) for 1999, down from 37.8 million (573,000 USD) in the 1998 budget.

Meanwhile the budget for Health and indigenous medicine is 12.598 billion rupees (up slightly from 11.239 billion in 1998)

Social services have been allocated 2.371 billion (from 2.166 billion in 1998).

Education and Higher education are to receive 16.259 billion rupees (from 14.265 billion in 1998).