Kolkata, Jan 8 (IANS) The West Bengal government is slated to surpass the budgeted market borrowings for the current financial year 2025-26, as well as its projected accumulated debt by March 31, 2026, as indicated in the trend so far for the first nine months as well as the scheduled borrowings for the remaining three months of the financial year under review.
As per the budget documents for the financial year 2025-26, the state government was slated to borrow a total of Rs 81,972.333 crore from the open market in 2025-26.
However, as per the figures of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the West Bengal government had already borrowed around Rs 78,000 crore during the already concluded first nine months of the current financial year from April 1, 2025, to December 31, 2025.
According to the RBI’s data, the state government is slated to go for additional borrowing of around Rs 46,000 crore during the remaining three months of the current financial year. Out of that amount, Rs 14,500 crore of market borrowing is slated in January, Rs 14,000 crore in February, and Rs 17,500 crore in March.
Arithmetically, it means during the entire financial year of 2025-26, that is from April 1, 2025 to March 31, 2026, the West Bengal will end up borrowing of around Rs 1,24,000 crore (Rs 79,000 crore in the first nine months plus Rs 46,000 crore in the remaining three months), a figure much higher that the budgeted market borrowing of Rs 81,972.333 crore during the entire financial year under review.
As per the revised estimates for the same fiscal, the total accumulated debt figure for the state government was slated to increase to Rs 7,06,531.61 crore by the end of the fiscal under review on March 31, 2026.
Now, with the total market borrowing figure for 2025-26 being slated to far exceed the budgeted borrowing figure during the financial year under review, the accumulated debt figure is also expected to be more than the projected figure, not only proportionally but substantially.
By the end of the financial year 2010-11, which was the last fiscal under the 34-year-long Left Front rule, the accumulated debt figure of the West Bengal government was little over Rs 1,90,000 crore.
–IANS
src/vd
