NEW DELHI: Promises are free, keeping them is costly.
Once election euphoria has settled, knuckling down on the math to keep the ‘revdis’ flowing is an onerous job. Governments in Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra have found this out. The new Delhi government is about to as well.
On its way to wresting Delhi from AAP, BJP made several ambitious commitments to voters to outplay Kejriwal on his pet social welfare pitch.
Delhi Election Results 2025
The principal ones that will further stretch the balance sheet are the promise of a monthly guarantee of Rs 2,500 to women and a monthly pension of Rs 2,500 for seniors (rising to Rs 3,000 for 70-plus). BJP has also promised Rs 21,000 for expectant mothers and free education from KG to PG.
The enormity of the task the new regime has at hand in putting together finances for these promises can be gauged from the latest revenue and expenditure projections of the state. Delhi government projected a total tax revenue collection of Rs 58,750 crore in 2024-25, against last year’s Rs 53,680 crore.
Financing freebies in a season of deficit
The budget for the fiscal is Rs 76,000 crore, with the largest spend of 22% earmarked for education – a focal point of the AAP regime – at Rs 16,396 crore, followed by housing and urban development at Rs 9,800 crore (13%), healthcare and public health at Rs 8,685 crore (11%), transport infrastructure at Rs 7,470 crore (10%), water supply and sanitation at Rs 7,195 crore (9%), and social security and welfare at Rs 6,694 crore (9%) as the major heads.
With more than two-thirds of revenues being spent on salaries and establishment costs, the finance department had expressed worries last year about sliding into deficit for the first time. An exacerbating factor was a projected decline in revenues from taxes, non-tax sources and central receipts from Rs 64,142 crore to Rs 62,415 crore by the conclusion of the 2024-25 fiscal year.
Now, for the monthly guarantee of Rs 2,500 for underprivileged women, the income criteria for which is yet to be fixed, the exchequer is expected to face a heavy burden. While the new government works the calculators, an idea of how much this could be can be drawn from a similar scheme previously proposed by AAP for which around 38 lakh women qualified. The annual cost for it was projected to be Rs 11,000 crore.
On to the pension promise, Election Commission data shows Delhi has 24,44,476 residents above 60 years, of whom 13,78,797 are in the Rs 2,500 (60-69) bracket. This part of the pension plan will require an annual allocation of Rs 4,100 crore.
Other promises made by BJP – like cleaning the Yamuna, which became one of the biggest talking points of this election, and Delhi’s landfills in three years – will also need substantial allocations. Over the years, government has spent around Rs 8,000 crore on the Yamuna.
Sources said to meet expenses for new and ongoing welfare schemes, the new Delhi government will need more than Rs 25,000 crore annually (including Rs 11,000 crore to continue free water and electricity schemes of the AAP government). Asked if Delhi can receive a special package from the Centre, given its status as a Union Territory, a source said, “Considering the AAP government was running under financial liability of Rs 18,000 crore, the new government will have to be rigid in its revenue distribution and divert funds from capital expenditure or other sectors to fund all the new welfare schemes. The second option can be seeking the Centre’s help.”
The new dispensation will get a month to work on the maths to get funds for its promised schemes, with the budget for the new fiscal to be presented in March.
Delhi BJP chief Virendra Sachdeva said the central government had previously offered financial support for various initiatives, including Ayushman Bharat Yojana. “But AAP in Delhi was not ready to extend benefit of these scheme to the people of Delh. Now that BJP has won, it will make all arrangements to arrange funds in the budget, plug leakages and end corruption,” he said.
Other areas that will require immediate attention are the healthcare sector, where seven new hospitals and extensions of upgrades of another 17 that have already been sanctioned require Rs 10,200 crore, besides an annual budget of Rs 8,000 crore to operate these facilities, and Delhi Metro projects that need Rs 2,700 crore for completion of Phase III and expansion of Phase IV.
And then, there are funds needed to contain air pollution, a perennial fight for Delhi, and to repair and re-carpet its roads, a sore point for Delhiites in recent years as the quality of public infrastructure visibly degraded. Delhi government’s road infrastructure funding reduced from Rs 3,126 crore in 2023-24 to Rs 1,768 crore in 2024-25, with no additional underpasses or flyovers being proposed.