done by following a complicated set of rules and has to always be approved by Parliament. By the Appropriation Acts 2003,
2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007 Parliament itself enacted a clause which reads: “Any money allocated to recur-
rent expenditure or capital expendi- ture under the ‘Development Activities ‘ programme appearing under the head ‘Department of National Budget’ specified in the first schedule may be transferred to any other programme under any other head in that schedule, by order of the Secretary to the treasury or any other officer authorized by him. The money so transferred shall be deemed to have been covered by a Supplementary estimate submitted by the appropriate Minister.” This clause gives power to the
Secretary to the Treasury (or any other officer authorized by him)to transfer funds allocated for capital or recurrent expenditure under the head of the “Department of National Budget” to any other head. A large amount of money has been
allocated to this department under the appropriation bill. Vesting of such discretionary
powers on a public officer is a clear abdication of Parliament’s control over public finance. Once vested, Parliament ceases to have any knowl- edge or control over the choice of the Secretary to the treasury.The sit- uation is more confounded by the fact that this discretion is given to a public officer (or someone authorized by him) and not even to a Minister who would have been answerable to Parliament. With the tabling of the
Appropriation Bill of 2007 in Parliament, this provision came to the notice of a number of Members of Parliament and other citizens who petitioned the Supreme Court in terms of Article 121 of the Constitution challenging the consti- tutionality of the Bill.Article 120 of the Constitution gives the Supreme Court the sole and exclusive jurisdic- tion to determine any question as to whether any bill or any provision thereof is inconsistent with the Constitution.Article 121 enables the
President or any citizen to petition the Supreme Court to exercise it’s jurisdiction in respect of a Bill. The leader of the opposition raised this issue in Parliament as a matter of public importance. He pointed out that under section 6 of the Appropriation act of 2005 (and subsequent years)the Secretary to the Treasury (or any other officer author- ized by him) is empowered to transfer money under the “Development Works “project under the head of the “Department of National Budget” to any other project or head. He pro- ceeded to point out that purporting to act under this section, Shri B.A.K.W Mahendran (who did not have proof of any authority conferred on him by the Secretary to the Treasury) had transferred Rs. 1.5 bil- lion to establish a bank, which was a transfer of money to a non-existent head.Therefore it was an illegal trans- fer of funds.
He also pointed out various other similar instances of money being transferred illegally; one such being to establish a low-cost airline called “Mihin Air”, which could not
The Parliament building in Sri Lanka. 350 The Parliamentarian 2008/Issue Four