A hill state government fighting on two fiscal fronts — lower borrowings than its predecessor and a decade-old central grant axed mid-term — is making its case in public. Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu posted a pointed fiscal comparison on Friday, 23 October 2026, arguing that his Congress administration has borrowed substantially less than the previous BJP government while simultaneously absorbing the loss of a Revenue Deficit Grant (RDG) that the state had received for nearly 77 years.

The borrowing gap Sukhu is flagging

The numbers CM Sukhu puts forward are stark. The previous BJP government, which held office from 2017 to 2022 under Chief Minister Jairam Thakur, raised loans totalling Rs 43,261 crore during its tenure. The current Congress administration, Sukhu says, borrowed a cumulative Rs 37,718 crore from 2023-24 through 22 October 2026 — a difference of roughly Rs 5,543 crore. He frames this as proof of tighter fiscal management even under adverse conditions.

The post, written in Hindi, states: 'Hamari sarkar aane ke baad se lagbhag 77 varshon se mil rahi 10,000 crore rupaye ki RDG band kar di gayi' — 'Since our government came to power, the Rs 10,000 crore RDG that had been received for nearly 77 years has been stopped.' That is the second front, and arguably the sharper one.

What the RDG was — and why its closure stings

The Revenue Deficit Grant is a constitutional instrument. Article 275(2) of the Indian Constitution empowers Parliament to make grants-in-aid to states to bridge the gap between their expenditure and revenue — a lifeline designed specifically for states that structurally cannot balance their own books. Himachal Pradesh, a special-category hill state with limited industrial revenue and high terrain-linked administrative costs, has depended on this provision since shortly after Independence.

The 15th Finance Commission had recommended RDGs for eligible states, including Himachal Pradesh, for the period 2021–26. Sukhu's post implies the grant was discontinued by the central government after his party assumed office in December 2022 — a withdrawal he publicly attributes to the Union government's decision, not to any state-level policy failure. The loss of a grant of this magnitude, accumulated over decades into an annual expectation of approximately Rs 10,000 crore, represents a significant structural hole in state finances.

The centre-state fiscal blame game — and what's at stake next

This is a well-worn arena of Indian federalism. Opposition-ruled states routinely publicise comparisons of borrowing levels and central grant flows to highlight what they characterise as fiscal pressure from a Union government controlled by a rival party. Himachal Pradesh, which oscillates between Congress and BJP administrations, has long been unusually dependent on central transfers given its special-category status and thin own-tax base.

What sharpens the debate here is the constitutional grounding Sukhu invokes. By citing Article 275(2) explicitly, he is not merely making a political complaint — he is making a legal-fiscal argument that the RDG was a constitutionally mandated safety net, not a discretionary favour. Whether that framing gains traction will likely depend on the recommendations of the 16th Finance Commission, whose award will govern central-state transfers for the next five-year cycle and determine whether Himachal gets its revenue deficit covered going forward.

For now, Sukhu's message to the state's 7.5 million residents is clear: the Congress government is managing a sharper fiscal squeeze than its BJP predecessor faced, borrowing less, and still claiming to push development forward. The 2027-28 state budget will be the first hard test of whether those claims hold up on paper.