New Delhi: President-elect Pranab Mukherjee is against wasteful expenditure using the office of the President of India.

Mukherjee, who resigned as the federal finance minister to run for presidency last month, said in a recent interview that the expenses incurred in running and maintenance of the Rashtrapati Bhawan (President’s House) need to be stopped and that such expenses are subject to scrutiny.

Mukherjee who was declared elected Monday, is to be sworn-in as the 13th President of the Republic on Wednesday.

According to sources close to Mukherjee, he is fully aware about the extent of wasteful expenditure at the Rashtrapati Bhawan and one of his first steps would be to call for austerity measures and streamline expenses.

The outgoing President Pratibha Patil was criticised by several quarters for wasteful expenditure. She ended up being the most travelled President and often toured abroad with her family. The exchequer had to pay in excess of Rs 2 billion (Dh132.6 million) on her travel bills during the past five years.

The money for running the Rashtrapati Bhawan does not come from the budget prepared by the finance ministry and approved by the Parliament. Instead it is withdrawn from the consolidated fund which is totally unaccounted.

The president lives on two floors of the southern wing of the sprawling President’s House built over 330 acres of land. In all there are 340 rooms in the main building while staff live in several quarters built inside the President’s Estate.

It is often alleged that much work is outsourced at inflated rates for maintenance due to the greed of the staff. Such scandals are never investigated as no government or agency dares to question the institution of president while the president remains unaware of these developments.

“But with Mukherjee as the president, things are bound to change. He has been a political activist and as the finance minister often talked about cutting corners in government expenditure to overcome the economic challenge. For sure, he would live by example and he would not hesitate in ordering a probe in some of the scams inside the Rashtrapati Bhawan and live by example,” a close confidante of Mukherjee said.

Incidentally, Mukherjee is not expected to make wholesome changes in the president’s secretariat. There are indications that he may retain most of the staff who served his predecessor and may bring in just three people of his choice, namely Omita Paul, Pradip Gupta and Pradyut Guha.

Paul, who worked as adviser to Mukherjee while he served as ministers for defence and finance, is expected to take over as the President’s chief secretary in place of Christie Fernandez.

Gupta who belongs to the Indian Defence Accounts Services has been associated with Mukherjee for sometime and may be asked to take care of expenses, especially work on plugging the wasteful expenditure.

Guha, who has been political aide to Mukherjee, is expected to become one of his advisors during Mukherjee’s five-year presidency.