The amount of Secondary and Higher Education Cess collected during the last three years from direct and indirect taxes are as under :

Direct Taxes:                     (Rs. in crore)

 

Indirect Taxes:                    (Rs. in crore)

Since no Reserve Fund has been opened in the Public Account of India for the purpose of crediting the 1% Secondary & Higher Education Cess for expenditure towards related schemes/prgorammes, the expenditure provision for Department of School Education & Literacy and Department of Higher Education have been provided directly in their demands for Grants.  Considering that the Budget Allocation (BE) for the schemes of Secondary and Higher Education has been consistently higher than the amount collected towards 1% Education Cess right from the levy of the cess with effect from 2007-08, the amount collected towards 1% Edcuation cess is deemed to have been fully allocated for expenditure in the above Demands. The Gross Budgetary Support for the Department of Higher Education was Rs.10859.37 crore in 2008-09, Rs.15433 crore in 2009-10 and Rs.16694 crore in 2010-11.

The Government has taken various initiatives such as establishing mechanisms for performance monitoring and performance evaluation in Government on a regular basis which also include strengthening public accountability of flagship programmes and evaluation of the impact of such programmes.

This information was given by the Minister of State for Finance, Shri S.S. Palanimanickam in written reply to a question raised in Lok Sabha today.

Education cess allocation deemed allocated to departmental Demands for Grants despite no reserve fund being opened. No separate Reserve Fund was opened in the Public Account for the 1% Secondary & Higher Education Cess; therefore expenditure provision for the Department of School Education & Literacy and the Department of Higher Education is provided directly in their Demands for Grants. Since Budget Estimates for the schemes have consistently exceeded cess collections from 2007-08, the amount collected is deemed to have been fully allocated against those Demands for Grants.