Consider advancing budget to January, Modi urges states

New Delhi, April 23 : Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday asked the states to consider advancing the financial year to January-December and said that in a country where agricultural income is exceedingly important, budget should be prepared immediately after its receipt for the year.

Making the observation while delivering the closing remarks at the third meeting of the Governing Council of NITI Aayog here, he said there have been suggestions to have the financial year changed to January-to-December -- in place of the existing April-to-March -- and urged the states to take the initiative in this regard. 

He also called upon the states to use the GeM (Government e-Marketplace) platform to reduce corruption and increase transparency in government procurement, adding that the use of technologies such as BHIM and Aadhaar would result in significant savings for the states. 

Modi also reiterated the idea of holding simultaneous parliamentary and state assembly elections, saying that the country has suffered from economic and political mismanagement for long now, and that a constructive discussion has already begun on the subject.

He said that because of poor time management, many good initiatives and schemes had failed to deliver the anticipated results.