The year 2009-10 has been devoted to implementing financial practices for remaining well within the budget constraints. Following the practice of reducing travel costs by opting for travel by cheapest economy fares for all the visits by scientists/students on projects and seminars, the travel expenditure has been curtailed. In addition, the practice of housing visiting scientists from France in hotels, where facilities were of international standard, but reasonably priced was also adopted.

The Scentific Council had gone through a rigorous selection process for projects and only those projects which were of excellent scientific merit and had strong complementality of the research groups were recommended. During the year, 13 projects have been approved. The scholarship amounts to be paid to students from India working in French laboratories were routed through EGIDE in France which has proved to be an effective and efficient methodology for IFCPAR.

The Director and staff of the Centre would like to place on record their gratitude to the Indian Co- Chairman, Dr. T Ramasami, Secretary, DST, who had kindly offered to absorb the additional burden of arrears payable to the staff of IFCPAR, in view of the Sixth Pay Commission recommendations adopted by the Government of India.

The details of the expenditure incurred by the Centre during the Financial Year, under various budget heads are shown in the Table 5. A comparison with the previous two years is also provided. The chart 6 depicts, broadly the expenditure pattern, under various heads over the last ten years.

The number of proposals received and approved over a period of 5 years is given in Table 6. The budget has stabilized over a period of 3 years (Table 7). To have a meaningful impact and to ensure that good projects are not turned down due to constraints in budget, the Centre requires more support from the Government of India and Government of France. It is not possible to reduce expenditures beyond than the critical levels which have already been reached.

Centre's Premises
During the year 2009-10 Rs. 1.471 million equivalent to 0,022 Euro had been incurred on account of maintenance charges, equipment and municipal tax.

Financial Audit
The statutory audit of the accounts of the Centre was carried out by M/s. Rajeev Neelam & Associates, Chartered Accountants. The selection of the Auditor was made by the Government of India as required by the Bye-laws. The Auditors' Report with its attachments viz. Receipt & Payment Account, Income & Expenditure Account and Balance Sheet are given. These accounts, as certified by the Auditors, show all transactions in Rupees after converting the transactions in Euro into Rupees. However, as required by the Bye-laws, the Euro versions of all these accounts was also prepared and certified by the Auditors.

The Reserve Bank of India did not publish any exchange rate in relation to Rupee and Euro during last quarter of the financial year 2008-09. Consequently, the market rate obtained on last working day of the year, i.e. 31st March 2009 has been adopted for conversion of the transactions in Euro into Rupee and vice versa during the year 2009-10 in pursuance of the decision of the Governing Body of the Centre. While, the accounts of the earlier year 2008-09 was based on exchange rate in relation to Rupee and Euro of Rs. 63.04, the rate adopted during 2009-10 is Rs. 67.52.

Table : 5 - 2008-2009 & 2009-2010 Expenditure incurred during the financial years 2007-2008
(Rupees in million)


Chart No. 6

Table: 6

Table: 7 - Grant-in-aid received from
Government of India and
Government of France
(Rs in crores)