The question has been raised as to excess grants. The difficultly, I think, is natural. Members have said that when it is stated that no moneys can be spent by the executive beyond the limits fixed by the Appropriation Act, how is it that a case for excess grants can arise? That, I think, is the point. The reply to that is this: We are making provisions in the terms of an amendment moved by my Friend, PanditKunzru, which is new article 248-B on page 27 of List I, where there is a provision for the establishment of a Contingency Fund out of the Consolidated Fund of India. Personally myself, I do not think that such a provision is necessary because this question had arisen in Australia, in a litigation between the State of New South Wales and the Commonwealth of Australia, and the question there was whether the Commonwealth was entitled to establish a Contingency Fund when the law stated that all the revenues should be collected together into a Consolidated Fund, and the answer given by the Australian Commonwealth High Court was that the establishment of a Consolidated Fund would not prevent the legislature of the Parliament from establishing out of the Consolidated Fund any other Fund, although that particular fund may not be spent during that year, because it is merely an appropriation although in a different form. However, to leave no doubt on this point that it would be open to parliament, notwithstanding the provision of a Consolidated Fund to create a Contingency Fund, I am going to accept the amendment of my Friend, PanditKunzru, for the incorporation of a new article 248-B. It is, therefore, possible that apart from the fund that is issued on the basis of an Appropriation Act to the executive, the executive would still be in possession of the Consolidated Fund and such other fund as may be created by law from time to time. It would be perfectly possible for the executive without actually having any intention to break the Appropriation Act to incur expenditure in excess of what is voted by Parliament and draw upon the contingency Fund or the other fund. Therefore, a breach of the Act has been committed and it is possible to commit such an act because the executive in an emergency thinks it ought to be done and there is provision of fund for them to do so. The question, therefore, is this: when an act like this is done, are you not going to make a provision for the regularisation of that act? In fact, if I may say so, that passing of an excess grant is nothing else but an indemnity Act passed by Parliament to exonerate certain officers of Government who have in good faith done something which is contrary to the law for the time being. There is nothing else in the idea of an excess grant and I would like to read to the Members of the House paragraph 230 from the House of Commons–Manual of Procedure for the Public business. This is what paragraph 230 says:-“An excess grant is needed when a department has by means of advances from the Civil Contingencies Fund or the Treasury Chest Fund or out of funds derived from extra receipts or otherwise spent the money on any service during any financial year in excess of the amount granted for that service and for that year.”
