Outcome budgeting biggest achievement of AAP govt in the field of governance: Delhi Deputy CM Manish Sisodia

Outcome budgeting is the "biggest achievement" of the Kejriwal government in governance as it has helped remove bottlenecks to improve the delivery of services and goods to the people of Delhi, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said on Friday while releasing performance document for 2019-20.

The outcome budget was introduced in 2017-18 as a novel idea of the ruling AAP in Delhi. For the period 2018-19, it covered all major departments and agencies combined into eight major sectors. There are a total of 567 schemes which were evaluated on the basis of 2,220 output and 1,549 outcome indicators, he said.

"I consider outcome budget as the biggest achievement of our government in past 4.5 years in the field of governance," the Deputy Chief Minister said.

He was speaking at a national conference on outcome budgeting organised by Dialogue and Development Commission of Delhi (DDCD). Sisodia released the outcome budget of the Delhi government for 2019-20, saying the relevance and importance of linking budgetary outlays with outcomes has been established through this comprehensive exercise. He said outcome budget is the force behind big-ticket reforms by the Delhi government in power and water supply, education, healthcare and doorstep delivery services. Sisodia asserted that in the next couple of decades, outcome budgeting will emerge as the baseline for reforms in governance.

Under the outcome budget, major programmes and schemes of various departments were identified and related output and outcome indicators were defined in a quantifiable manner. The indicators were such as to be specific, measurable, attributable, realistic and targeted (SMART), said Jasmine Shah, vice chairman of DDCD.

Delhi's outcome budget is a suo-moto disclosure of information and data and a top-most initiative for the promotion of transparency and accountability in governance, he added.