New Delhi, June 17 -- Revenue spending dominated the budgets of states, averaging 83% of total spending between 2015-16 and 2024-25 and subsidies and committed spending (on such things as salaries, pensions, and debt servicing) accounted for 53.31% of the aggregate spending of states in 2024-25. These are topline findings from the Comptroller and Auditor General of India's (CAG) third edition of its report on state finances that was released on Tuesday. The report summarises key takeaways from audited spending of 28 state governments in India for the financial year 2024-25 and also looks at long-term trends over the past decade. The data is important because many states have taken on debt to fund their expenditure. Across India, and cutting across political lines, states have embarked on a rash of welfare schemes, usually involving cash handouts to women and unemployed youth. According to the report, 13 states had a debt-GSDP ratio of more than 32.8% of Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) in 2024-25, which is the limit set by the 15th Finance Commission for debt sustainability. To be sure, individual states show significant variation from macro trends. Capital expenditure, according to the report increased in absolute terms, "but remained a relatively smaller share." It added that subsidies grew "particularly rapidly". "Between 2015-16 and 2024-25, States' aggregate expenditure rose sharply by 131%, broadly keeping pace with economic growth. Revenue expenditure continued to dominate budgets, averaging over 83% of total spending, while capital expenditure increased in absolute terms but remained a relatively smaller share.Committed expenditure and subsidies consistently absorbed more than half of revenue expenditure, reaching 53.31%in FY 2024-25, with subsidies growing particularly rapidly," the report notes. The total revenue receipts of all the states for 2024-25 stood at Rs.40.52 lakh crore. Half of it came from states' own tax revenue and about one-third from devolution of central taxes, with the rest coming from non-tax revenue and grants-in-aid. Almost all of capital receipts for the states came from public debt. 18 states were above the "indicative benchmark of fiscal deficit" of three percent of GSDP in 2024-25, the report said. On the revenue deficit front, 13 states recorded a surplus, while 15 had a deficit, it says. In FY 2024-25, 18 states had fiscal deficits above the indicative benchmark of three percent of GSDP. "States' own tax revenue (SOTR), which was 6.26 percent of GSDP, witnessed a buoyancy ratio of 0.67 in FY 2024-25 for the States combined," the report said, implying that revenues underperformed growth in the latest year of the study....