In Odisha, the government has made continuous efforts to achieve the objectives of public expenditure management in view of the inherent deficiency of tax capacity to meet the rising public expenditure. Given the necessity of such an expenditure for ensuring the provision of basic facilities for citizens, it needs to be managed well to ensure efficiency, stability and development. Analysing fiscal discipline and strategic prioritisation of public expenditure using secondary data from 1980–81 to 2018–19, and the operational efficiency of public expenditure using primary data about the construction of check dams, it is found that fiscal discipline in Odisha is unsustainable due to lack of strategic prioritisation and operational inefficiency.
