Kerala will need to work out radical changes in its fiscal policy in the troubled post-COVID-19 economic scenario to resolve the acute fiscal crisis that it faces and restore stability, according to a new book on the State’s economic development against the backdrop of the pandemic.
The changes should be directed at ramping up revenue, restricting non-priority, non-Plan revenue spending, limiting borrowings to manageable levels and achieving fiscal targets set by the Fiscal Responsibility Act, observes Kerala’s Economic Development: COVID-19 Pandemic, Economic Crisis and Public Policy, a collection of essays edited by B. A. Prakash, former chairman of the Kerala Public Expenditure Review Committee and the State Finance Commission, and Jerry Alwin, Associate Professor of Economics, SN College, Varkala.
The book, which has 21 essays by different authors on diverse Kerala-specific topics set against the backdrop of the pandemic, will be released in Thiruvananthapuram on Saturday.
