160 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
pocket, that had hitherto prevailed upon the Government of India to shorten the duration of contracts as much as possible. But what was an advantage to the Imperial treasury was from the standpoint of the Provincial Government a serious drawback. Owing to the short durations of the settlements the Provincial Governments were not in a position to distribute the funds at their disposal on the incorporated services so as to open a new page in their financial history. They could not adopt a definite financial policy, for they feared that the new terms on renewal might compel them either to give up the policy or modify it so seriously as to prejudice its results. A single budget may seem nothing more than the conspectus of financial happennings of the year to which it pertains, yet to the financier who frames them year after year they embody a definite policy running towards its consummation. But a policy, however wisely adopted, may be thwarted by an unwise disturbance of the uniformity of conditions on which its fulfilment depends. This was just the flaw that deteriorated the sound working of Provincial Finance. Constant renewals had a general disturbing effect, and the duration between any two of them was indeed too short to give a stable state of conditions. Being impressed by the fact that the advantages of a short-duration-contract to the Imperial treasury were enormously counterbalanced by its disadvantages to Provincial Finance, the Government of India, on the occasion of revising the settlements in 1882-3, made it a definite rule that they shall be quinquennial in duration; that is, they shall not be subject to revision before the end of the fifth year from their commencement.
Revision of 1887-8
By virtue of this rule the settlements made in 1882-3 expired in 1887. The revision then undertaken, as well as the subsequent ones, left as a rule undisturbed the two categories of revenue and expenditure, namely, those wholly Provincial and wholly Imperial. It became almost a convention to leave them as they were since the separation in 1882, when the constitution of Provincial Budgets was thoroughly overhauled and consolidated. The only heads of revenue and expenditure that were revised, as revision fell due, were those that were grouped under the third category, namely, jointly Imperial and Provincial, otherwise known as “Divided Heads.”