On no occasion 119 dalit MPs have ever debated fund allocations for dalits in the Central Govt. budget and if it was done by someone, replies prepared by bureaucrats and the answer of finance minister silenced him. Could these MPs ever think that despite thousands of crores of budgetary allocation for dalits, their situation remained more or less the same. Budget of 2005-2006 presented by P. Chidambaram allocates Rs. 1599.70 crores to the Ministry of Social Justice Empowerment which is not exclusively for SCs/STs but for backwards and minorities also. The average population of SCs and STs is about 25%. The total expenditure in the budget this year is Rs. 5,14,343.8 crores and the non-plan expenditure is kept at Rs. 3,70,847.02 crores. According to population ratio of dalits, if plan and non-plan expenditures are put together, their budgetary share comes to Rs. 1,28,496.78 crores. Let us compromise by not asking for the share out of the non-plan expenditure. Then fund allocation of Rs. 35,874.19 crores should be made for dalits out of plan expenditure but it is only Rs. 6253.04 crores including that of Social Justice and Empowerment Ministry.

Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment is allocated Rs. 1599.70 crores. However, total budgetary expenditure is Rs. 6253.04 crores which includes expenditure put at the disposal of other ministries including Social Justice and Empowerment. To some extent, it is possible to have a watch mechanism on the expenditure of the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment but there is no way to do so in respect of other ministries.

It is normally believed that non-plan expenditure doesn't relate to welfare schemes and, therefore, asking for dalits' share out of this is not justified. Under the head of non-plan expenditure, social service gets Rs. 7521.99 crores, education is allotted Rs. 2992.93 crores which comprises of Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangthan (Rs. 598.94 crores), Novodaya Vidyalaya (Rs. 143.85 crores), University Grant Commission (Rs. 1218.75 crores) and other like heads. Health and family welfare share comes to Rs. 986.33 crores and labour is at Rs. 983.47 crores. Non-plan expenditure is that expenditure which is separate form plan expenditure. Non-plan expenditure is mainly meant for interest payment, pension, defence and other recurring expenditures. Even then, about Rs. 50 thousand crores can be apportioned for welfare schemes as can be understood by above allocations made under different heads. The total expenditure is kept at Rs. 5,14,343.8 crores and if allocation is made out of it according to population ratio then it comes to Rs. 1,28,58.95 crores for dalits but the total expenditure in the budget is Rs.6,253.04 crores only for dalits. The total plan-expenditure is Rs. 1,43,496.78 crores and if 50 thousand crores out of non-plan expenditure is clubbed with this, it will be around Rs. 2 lac crores. Dividing this expenditure by the population ratio of dalits, it ccomes to about Rs. 50 thousand crores for dalits'welfare. In the present budget, the expenditure meant for them is Rs. 62,53.04 crores and if it is divided by 25 crores population of dalits, per dalit it will be Rs. 250.13 a year. From no point of view it is even minimal to cater to their welfare. If corruption is taken into account, the situation is much worse. Once Rajeev Gandhi said that whatever money was allocated at the govt. level, only 15 percent of the same reached the beneficiaries. Considering this magnitude of corruption, it will be Rs. 37.5 instead of Rs. 250.13 per dalit in a year.

There is a drastic cut in the budget as far as expenditure on scheduled caste boy students' hostel is concerned. In the previous budget it was Rs. 10 crores but it has come down to one lac in 2005-06 budget. For scheduled caste girl students' hostel it has been cut to Rs. One lac against Rs. 3 crores in the budget of 2004-05. What a joke it is to make provision of Rs. one lac for all scheduled caste boys' hostels in the country? It shows the intention of the govt. The budget of 2004-05 made a fund allocation of Rs. 169.29 crores in public enterprises meant for social security and welfare and in the current budget it is Rs. 110.70 crore. For Adivasi Ashrams and Schools, budget allocation was Rs. 6 crores in 2004-05 which has been totally wiped out in the current budget. In the previous budget, Rs. 13 crore was allocated for the scheduled tribe boys' and girls' hostels but it has been totally squared up in the present budget. Similarly, budgetary allocation discouraged scheduled castes - scheduled tribes from entrepreneurship by reducing the size of funds. This gives indication that govt. does not want to empower dalits in the field of industrialization.

A sum of Rs. 1599.70 crores is to be spent by the ministry of social justice and empowerment and the rest of expenditure by other ministries. Most of the dalit Members of Parliament do not believe in reading and writing and therefore they don't vent their grievances. Unfortunately, dalits get leaders like Mayawati and Ram Vilas Paswan who have no understanding of such subjects nor do they try to know it. The dalit MPs should have tried to know who was monitoring the implementation of schemes meant for dalits. In the present situation, neither Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment nor Planning Commission has any mechanism and system to monitor the expenditures. How can it be ensured that other departments will necessarly spend for dalits? Who is to be held responsible for misutilization and non-utilization of funds?

Even Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment does not have a mechanism to ensure the proper utilization of funds. For instance, a proposal was sent to the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment to clear the scholarship funds for 2000 dalit students. Bureaucrats in the ministry sat on the file so that it could lapse after March 2005. A sum is kept aside for NGOs in the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment but that hardly goes to authentic organisations. Even political pressure does not work because clerks are experts in raising objections in files. Various NGOs are de facto represented by other than scheduled castes and naive dalits are just kept to sign the papers. Such NGOs know how to get the file work done. If Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment is not in a position to check the leakage, how can expenditure be ensured in other ministries? If not now, in future dalits would ask for their share in the budget and its implementation. Alas ! if only political bosses of different parties could field educated dalits as candidates for Parliament and Dalit movements could press for educated, honest and intelligent representation.