Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh among BJP states that lagged in capex, some spent less than half their budget

New Delhi: Four BJP-ruled states—Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur—have lagged in capital expenditure in FY2025-26, with some spending less than half of their budget estimates, data released by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India showed.

Capital expenditure, or capex, refers to funds used by governments to develop assets that contribute to economic growth. This includes government spending and investments on infrastructure such as roads, healthcare, education, and more. It can also cover expenses on repairing or upgrading existing assets, repaying loans and other investments.Rajasthan recorded a sharp decline among the four, with capex utilisation sliding to 51.82 percent of its budget estimate (BE) of Rs 56,327.33 crore in FY26, down from 74.87 percent in FY25.

In Chhattisgarh, utilisation was 57.12 percent of its Rs 26,341 crore BE—a marginal improvement over 55.10 percent a year earlier, though still poor.The two BJP-governed north-eastern states fared worse. Arunachal Pradesh utilised 39.64 percent of its Rs 8,842 crore BE—fractionally up from 38.92 percent in FY25, but among the lowest in the country.Manipur, still grappling with ethnic violence that erupted in May 2023, spent 47.56 percent of its Rs 4,040 crore BE, less than half the budgeted allocation, though this represented a marked recovery from 25.25 percent in the same period last year.Poor capex utilisation cut across party lines.West Bengal–where the BJP won power for the first time earlier this month after ousting the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress–spent 48 percent of its Rs 39,337.74 crore BE in FY26, down from 60.40 percent a fiscal year earlier. Development stagnation and rising unemployment had been central to the BJP’s campaign against the Banerjee government.Jharkhand, a state ruled by the JMM-Congress combine, spent 50.72 percent of its Rs 24,908.18 crore BE in FY26, down from 61.15 percent in FY25. Mizoram, led by the Zoram People’s Movement government, saw the weakest utilisation of all states in the datasets released—34.57 percent of its Rs 2,235.81 crore BE—barely above 33.49 percent a year earlier.Explaining why states may not have been able to utilise their capex budgets, former member of the Finance Commission Govind Rao told ThePrint that some may have “over-estimated their revenue and later realised that it is lower”.“If this is the case, the states will have to compress. You can’t cut revenue expenditure and your committed liabilities, including salary and wages, so you cut your capex,” Rao said.He said another possibility could be that some additional revenue expenditure has come up. “So your priorities change. As a result, your revenue expenditure has increased. To adjust that, states will have to cut capex,” he said.Graphic: Shruti Naithani | ThePrint