BPSC 70th CCE Prelims General Studies · Question 138 of 143

Correct — C, Education. In the Bihar Budget for 2024-25, presented on 13 February 2024 by Finance Minister Samrat Chaudhary, the head 'Education, Sports, Arts and Culture' received ₹54,605 crore — comfortably the largest sectoral allocation, and roughly double the next one, Rural Development at ₹27,101 crore. The gap over the options in this question is wider still: Health and Family Welfare got ₹14,488 crore, Agriculture and Allied Activities ₹7,943 crore, and Roads and Bridges — the nearest single head to 'Infrastructure' — ₹7,723 crore. Education therefore took about 3.8 times what health got, about 6.9 times agriculture and about 7.1 times roads. In proportional terms, PRS Legislative Research's analysis of the budget records that Bihar devoted 21.4 per cent of its total expenditure to education against an average of 14.7 per cent across 31 states, while spending below the state average on health (5.7 per cent against 6.2), agriculture (3.1 against 5.9) and roads and bridges (3 against 4.6). So Bihar is not merely spending most on education in absolute terms; it is a conspicuous outlier upwards on education and slightly below par on everything else in this list. For scale, the whole budget's net expenditure excluding debt repayment was estimated at ₹2,56,333 crore, with the fiscal deficit targeted at 3 per cent of GSDP, or ₹29,095 crore, inside the permitted ceiling of 3.5 per cent.

• (a)Health — Health and Family Welfare received ₹14,488 crore, about 5.7 per cent of Bihar's expenditure — a little below the 6.2 per cent average across states and barely a quarter of the education allocation. It is a large, visible department, which is why it draws the guess, but it has never been Bihar's biggest.
• (b)Agriculture — Agriculture and Allied Activities received ₹7,943 crore, about 3.1 per cent of expenditure against a 5.9 per cent state average. Bihar is an overwhelmingly agrarian state, so candidates assume its budget must follow its economy — but most farm support reaches the state through central schemes and price policy rather than through its own sectoral allocation.
• (d)Infrastructure — 'Infrastructure' is not a single head in the budget documents; the closest one, Roads and Bridges, received ₹7,723 crore — about 3 per cent of expenditure against a 4.6 per cent state average, and a fall of 40 per cent on the previous year's revised estimate. Road and bridge building is highly visible in Bihar, which makes this the most intuitive wrong answer.

A state budget is read in two ways at once, and examiners use both. The first is by absolute allocation — which department gets the most rupees — and the second is by share of total expenditure, which is what allows a state to be compared with others. PRS Legislative Research publishes both for every state each year, together with the average across the 31 states that present budgets, which is where the comparison figures in this answer come from. Bihar's structure has been stable for years: education is the largest single head, rural development second, and the state runs a fiscal deficit close to the 3 per cent of GSDP norm under its Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management legislation, with the Fifteenth Finance Commission permitting a higher ceiling of 3.5 per cent for the year. The reason education dominates is largely arithmetic rather than ideological: the head bundles school and higher education with sports, arts and culture, and its cost is overwhelmingly salaries and pensions for one of the largest teaching workforces of any Indian state.

The reasoning route here does not need the exact rupee figure. Ask which department employs the most people, because in a state budget salaries dominate, and in Bihar that is unambiguously school education. Then check the counter-intuition, because this question is built on one: Bihar's economy is agrarian, so a candidate reasons from the economy to the budget and picks agriculture — but a budget reflects what the state government itself pays for, and most farm support flows through central schemes, minimum support prices and credit rather than through the state's own sectoral head. The same trap operates for infrastructure: roads and bridges are the most visible public spending in Bihar over the last two decades, and visibility is not size. Finally, note that 'Infrastructure' is not a budget head at all, which is a hint in itself — when three options name real heads and one names a category, the odd one out is usually not the answer. Learn the top two or three heads of the Bihar budget and their approximate shares; that is enough for every question of this type.

• The Bihar Budget 2024-25 was presented on 13 February 2024 by Finance Minister Samrat Chaudhary; net expenditure excluding debt repayment was estimated at ₹2,56,333 crore
• Education, Sports, Arts and Culture received ₹54,605 crore — the largest sectoral allocation, about double the next head, Rural Development at ₹27,101 crore
• Health and Family Welfare received ₹14,488 crore, Agriculture and Allied Activities ₹7,943 crore, and Roads and Bridges ₹7,723 crore
• Bihar allocated 21.4 per cent of its expenditure to education against a 31-state average of 14.7 per cent, but fell below average on health (5.7 against 6.2 per cent), agriculture (3.1 against 5.9) and roads and bridges (3 against 4.6)
• The fiscal deficit for 2024-25 was targeted at 3 per cent of GSDP, or ₹29,095 crore, within the permitted ceiling of 3.5 per cent

• Reasoning from the state's economy to its budget — Bihar is agrarian, but agriculture is a small share of its own expenditure
• Equating visibility with size; roads and bridges are conspicuous in Bihar but take about 3 per cent of spending
• Treating 'Infrastructure' as a budget head — the documents use specific heads such as Roads and Bridges, Energy and Water Resources

BPSC lifts numbers straight from the state Budget and the Bihar Economic Survey and asks them as bare recall — the largest allocation, a per capita figure, a growth rate — so the same two documents are worth reading in summary every year before the paper. UPSC does not ask what a state allocated to a sector; it asks the concepts around the budget instead, such as what counts as non-plan or committed expenditure, or how fiscal, revenue and primary deficits differ from one another.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Which sector received the second highest allocation in the Bihar Budget 2024-25 ?

  • (a)Health and Family Welfare
  • (b)Rural Development
  • (c)Roads and Bridges
  • (d)Agriculture and Allied Activities

  Answer(b) Rural Development — ₹27,101 crore, behind Education, Sports, Arts and Culture at ₹54,605 crore and well ahead of health, roads and agriculture.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The fiscal deficit targeted in the Bihar Budget 2024-25 was

  • (a)1.5% of GSDP
  • (b)3% of GSDP
  • (c)4.5% of GSDP
  • (d)6% of GSDP

  Answer(b) 3% of GSDP — about ₹29,095 crore, within the 3.5 per cent ceiling permitted to the state for that year.