Bhubaneswar, Aug. 9: The state government today said it had achieved a better fiscal performance this year compared to the previous year.

This was revealed at the meeting of all secretaries, presided over by chief secretary Aditya Prasad Padhi, today that the state had registered a 15 per cent increase in revenue collection up to July this year, compared to the corresponding period of the previous year. The total revenue collection up to July this year was around Rs 9,766 crore as against around Rs 8,492 crore in the corresponding period of previous year.

The state's own tax revenue has grown by around 12 per cent with total collection of Rs 7,552 crore and the non-tax revenue by around 26 per cent with total collection of Rs 2,214 crore.

The state had bettered its performance in terms of utilisation of budgetary allocation (23 per cent rise) over the same period. The budgetary expenditure up to July in 2016 was around Rs 13,209 crore which has gone up to Rs 16,305 crore by end of July this year.

The total expenditure up to July has been around Rs 26,921 crore against Rs 24,918 crore spent during the corresponding period of the previous year, registering a growth of 8 per cent.

The review revealed that the expenditure in agriculture and allied sector was up by 22 per cent over the same period (up to July end).

Under this sector, the programmes executed by agriculture and animal resources development department and water resources department have been covered.

The growth in social sector spending had been significant (around 52 per cent). A sum of Rs 7,154 crore had been in this sector spent up to July this year against Rs 4,693 crore during the same period of last financial year.

The programmes under this sector basically pertain to education, health and family welfare, skill development and social security.

Similarly, a sum of Rs 3,993 crore has been spent in infrastructure sector by July this year. The expenditure has been incurred on urban development, housing, construction of roads and buildings, rural development and electrification. Officials present at today's meeting said chief secretary Padhi directed all the departments to better the trend by stepping up revenue collection and utilisation of budgetary allocation.

He also asked secretaries to keep track of central funds allocation and follow up on pending allocations through use of online public finance management system.

Secretaries of various departments were also advised to focus on actual service delivery at the field level.

The state government had held a three-day workshop in June involving senior officials and districts collectors to improve public service delivery at the cutting edge.