Question

By ‘charged’ expenditure it is meant _____
A)Expenditure from the Consolidated Fund of India which is non-votable
B)Expenditure incurred for which payment is pending
C)Expenditure that the president can incur without Parliament’s approval
D)The sum required to meet all expenditure proposed to be made from the Consolidated Fund of India

Answer 1

Hint: 1)This type of expenditure is a characteristic of the Westminster System of government.
2)The body that carries out this expenditure is the same body to which the taxes are paid.

Complete answer:
‘Charged expenditure’ are also called ‘Non-Votable’ expenditure. These are the expenditures which have to be paid by the government without any voting. It means that it does not matter whether the budget is passed by the Parliament or not, these payments will be made either ways.

These payments are made from the main bank account of the government. This is called the Consolidated Fund. This is also the bank account into which the general taxes are paid. This system of money management by the government has been derived from the Westminster System of Government. This parliamentary system was first developed by Great Britain and the Indian Government is also based on this system.

The following are some of the ‘charged expenditure’ that the consolidated fund of India makes –
1)Emoluments and other expenditures of the President.
2)Salaries and allowances of the Chairman and Deputy Chairmen of the Two Houses of the Parliament.
3)Salaries of Judges of Supreme Court
4)Salaries of members of the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC)
Etc.

Hence, the correct answer is option (A)

Note: The Budget consists of two categories of expenditures; expenditure that is ‘charged’ upon the consolidated fund and expenditures ‘made’ from the consolidated fund.
The expenditures that are made from the consolidated fund will only be made once it has been discussed in the Parliament and has also been passed or voted.
Without the voting, these expenditures cannot be carried out. Thus, they are also called votable expenditure.