BEST saves face, passes budget

Dramatic scenes over Rs 355 crore loan

The Brihanmumbai Electric Supply & Transport (BEST) budget for 2016-17 was passed amid severe embarrassment to the undertaking as BMC standing committee chairman Yashodhar Phanse, who is an ex-officio member, objected to the budget minutes before it was to be passed.

Mr Phanse questioned the BEST’s assumption in its budget that the BMC would give it a loan of '355.36 crore. A last-ditch move saw the shortfall of '355.35 crore covered by adding an expected income of '280 crore generated by the sale of power and another '100.36 crore generated from transport fare.

Mr Phanse’s stand, which caused a panic-like situation, occurred at around 5.30 pm after which BEST committee chairman Arvind Dudhvadkar asked for a five minute tea-break for discussion. “What if we can’t get you the money Then what How can this be assumed in the budget,” a visibly irate Mr Phanse asked before heading into the Mr Dudhvadhkar’s office with the BEST general manager Jagdish Patil and members of the committee. The meeting went on for another half-an-hour, during which Mr Phanse reportedly fumed over how such a big amount could be “assumed” to be a part of the budget.

Some officials said the move to compensate the sudden shortfall of '355 crore was an effort to save face. “We have to submit the final budget by November 26 and it would have been too risky to wait until Monday. To add to it the incident has happened in front of the media so the management as well as the Shiv Sena who run the BMC did not want bad publicity,” said an official on the condition of anonymity. The decision was read out by Shiv Sena committee member Suhas Samant and passed by the members after a majority vote.

The BEST had made its calculation for the financial year 2016-17 assuming that the loan would be granted and made the calculations accordingly. The budget was being discussed in the undertaking’s office at Electric House for the approval of its committee members and Mr Phanse’s objection came at the very end of the discussion. He said the entire budget cannot be based on the possibility of the BMC loan being given and refused to give assurance about the loan.