Srinagar: Chief Secretary Atal Dulloo has directed the Planning Department to prepare a comprehensive roadmap for aligning Jammu and Kashmir’s budgetary planning with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), following a review of a strategy proposed by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
Chairing a meeting here, Dulloo asked the department to constitute a dedicated team to work with the UNDP and identify interventions required under each SDG to achieve targeted outcomes over the coming years.
He directed officials to map all Centrally Sponsored Schemes and Union Territory government schemes against relevant SDGs to clearly establish their contribution towards specific goals and targets. He also called for identifying additional interventions and resource requirements needed to bridge development gaps.
The Chief Secretary emphasised that achieving SDGs requires coordinated action across departments and sectors rather than isolated interventions. He stressed the need for convergence of schemes, targeted implementation and outcome-based monitoring to ensure measurable results.
Additional Chief Secretary, Finance, Shailendra Kumar, said each scheme should be assigned a clear role in achieving SDG targets. He also stressed capacity building of departmental officers and functionaries to facilitate effective implementation of the proposed framework and called for early initiation of the exercise so that it can be incorporated into the next budget cycle.
During the meeting, the UNDP presented a preliminary roadmap for integrating SDGs into Jammu and Kashmir’s budgeting and public financial management systems. The proposal envisages a three-year programme aimed at linking budgetary allocations with departmental outputs, measurable outcomes and SDG targets.
The proposed framework includes an SDG Budget Tagging Framework, an integrated digital platform linked with the Integrated Financial Management Information System (IFMIS), and institutional capacity building through an Output-Outcome Monitoring Framework.
Under the proposal, departmental schemes and expenditure heads would be mapped against specific SDGs and classified as directly contributing, indirectly contributing or neutral. The framework is proposed to cover all 20 government departments and district budgets.
A web-based SDG-IFMIS portal has also been proposed to track and analyse budget allocations and expenditure linked to SDGs, with department-wise, district-wise and goal-wise monitoring features.
According to the presentation, Jammu and Kashmir’s composite score in the NITI Aayog SDG India Index improved from 53 in 2018 to 74 in 2023-24, an increase of 21 points. The Union Territory was ranked the second fastest-improving UT and second overall among Union Territories.
Officials said the proposed framework is expected to strengthen outcome-based governance, improve convergence among schemes, identify underfunded development areas and support evidence-based allocation of public resources. It is also expected to help track regional disparities and improve planning for remote and underserved areas.
