Will India, some day, collect a sum of Rs 300 crore, which is due from Pakistan since Independence? That remains to be seen.
Mr Murali Mohan, Chairman, Mangalore branch of ICAI (Institute of Chartered Accountants of India), told Business Line that in Annexure-5 of the Receipts Budget, there is a statement of liabilities of the Central Government.
It shows total liabilities at Rs 43,52,689 crore. From this, Rs 300 crore is deducted as ‘Amount due from Pakistan on account of share of pre-Partition debt (approx)', and the net liability is shown as Rs 43,52,389 crore.
He said this was brought to the notice of ICAI by Mr Giridhar Prabhu, a Mangalore-based cashew exporter, when the ICAI Mangalore branch was planning a unique programme called ‘India's balance sheet'.
Referring to the Budget speech of 1948, he said Pakistan's total debt was to be repaid in Indian rupees in 50 annual equated instalments for principal and interest. The first repayment should have commenced in 1952.
In the Budget 1952-53, credit was taken for a recovery of Rs 9 crore from Pakistan, as the first instalment of its repayment to India. But not a paisa came in, he said.
In the 1954 Budget speech, the then Union Finance Minister said: “The budget for current year placed the revenue at Rs 439.26 crore and expenditure at Rs 438.81 crore, leaving a surplus of Rs 45 lakh. In balancing this budget, I had taken credit for a recovery of Rs 18 crore from Pakistan on account of two instalments due from that country in repayment of partition debt.
“I have been having discussions on this subject with the Finance Minister of Pakistan, and we both hope that it will be possible to commence repayment of the debt in the coming year. This single factor has made for a deterioration of Rs 18 crore in the revenue budget for the current year, and converted the surplus of Rs 45 lakh into a deficit of Rs 16.96 crore.”
In the next Budget speech, he said: “I am not taking any credit for repayment of Partition debt by Pakistan in view of what has happened in the last two years.”
Mr Murali Mohan wondered why, if India has not been not able to collect this amount from Pakistan for the past 65 years, it still keeps showing it in the Budget, year after year, instead of just writing it off.
vinayakaj@thehindu.co.in