AP Budget presented in full e-format

In a first, Andhra Pradesh Finance Minister Yanamala Ramakrishnudu today presented the 2016-17 Budget in full electronic format with budgetary proposals supplied to the MLAs in Tablet computers. Tablet PCs loaded with the Budget proposals, the Socio-Economic Survey 2015-16, and other related documents were give to the legislators while journalists got all that on an 8-GB pen drive. It was for the eighth time that Yanamala, as Finance Minister, presented the Budget, including three in the truncated state. "I am happy to inform the House that the Budget for 2016-17 is unique on several counts. First and foremost, it's an e-Budget with all documents being made available in easily readable format on a Tablet that you can carry anywhere and refer to at anytime," the Minister said in his speech. It was also a "truly decentralised" Budget as each of the 20,800 drawing and disbursing officers (DDO) in the state prepared the proposals for the unit under their control, he said. "This is a genuinely outcome-focused Budget with unwavering focus on performance and outcomes rather than the traditional input-based Budget. It is also a demand-driven Budget based on the needs of the grassroots and expectations of the people. We have obtained inputs from the public and incorporated them suitably," he told the Assembly. Yanamala, who took 125 minutes to read out the 57-page text, quoted eminent personalties like A P J Abdul Kalam, H W Longfellow, Swami Vivekananda, Shakespeare, Winston Churchill, Thomas Jefferson, Franklin D Roosevelt, B R Ambedkar, and Wilfred Peterson in his speech. His colleagues and fellow legislators of the ruling TDP and the BJP congratulated Yanamala as he completed his Budget presentation.