Imphal: Manipur Congress leaders are demanding accountability following a scathing Comptroller and Auditor General audit for 2024-25. The report exposes deep cracks in state financial management. The government left nearly nine thousand crore rupees on the table. It failed to spend funds while the state’s debt burden hit record levels.
Congress Legislature Party leader Keisham Meghachandra Singh addressed reporters at Congress Bhavan in Imphal. He laid out the grim math. Out of a total budget of 37,392.66 crore rupees, 8,927.55 crore rupees remained untouched. That is a 23.88 percent failure rate in budget execution.
Capital expenditure suffered the most. The state budgeted 8,989.60 crore rupees for infrastructure but only spent 2,704.23 crore rupees. Meanwhile, 138 infrastructure projects remain unfinished despite 7,473.53 crore rupees already poured into them. These delays threaten to balloon project costs significantly.
Central funding also fell short of expectations. The state budgeted 16,015.85 crore rupees in grants-in-aid but only collected 5,473.21 crore rupees. Singh demanded an immediate explanation for this 10,542.64 crore rupee shortfall. Borrowing patterns look equally desperate. Manipur raised 11,599.08 crore rupees in gross borrowings, yet 81.22 percent of that cash went toward paying off old principal debts.
Total debt ballooned to 20,846.88 crore rupees. Interest payments alone cost 1,022.23 crore rupees this year. Singh also questioned why 229.94 crore rupees meant for Relief and Disaster Management went unspent during a period of intense security and humanitarian crisis. He pushed for officials to take responsibility or resign.
"The CAG is not an opposition party. It is the constitutional auditor of public money," Singh said. He argued that the state needs a clear roadmap to stop the bleeding. The government must explain why development expenditure failed to keep pace with borrowing. With Revised Estimates for 2025-26 projecting liabilities reaching 32,590.57 crore rupees, the Congress is calling for transparency.
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