Academicians at a workshop on budget at Berhampur University. Picture by Gopal Krishna Reddy

Berhampur, May 8: A national-level workshop here has stressed on creating awareness among the public and academicians on the implications of budget.

The University Grants Commission supported workshop was organised by Berhampur University yesterday in collaboration with the Orissa Budget and Accountability Centre and the New Delhi-based Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability.

Addressing participants in the workshop, professor R. Sudarshan Rao, head of the department of economics at Andhra University, said the public must participate in budget mechanism on large-scale.“We must examine whether budget satisfies the principles of accountability or not. There is a constitutional mechanism to ensure that,” he said. In the democratic set up of India, the government has been always trying to maintain a balance between equity, efficiency and growth. There should be frequent discussion and generation of awareness among different stakeholders of the budget, he added.

“Nowadays, academicians express lack of interest in budget which is an instrument to monitor rights and commitments of the government. We must organise more such workshops for the participation of civil society in the implications of budget. Everybody must know how the budget is prepared and monitored, the accounting systems of the government and why budget is important for development or economic growth,” said Pravas Mishra, programme manager of the Orissa Budget and Accountability Centre. He stressed the need for pre-budget consultations in regional basis to decide the regional priorities and reflect it in the budget.

Laxmi Narayan Rout, chairman of postgraduate council of Berhampur University, said: “We have to discuss more on the budget to make it more transparent.”