"The practice of holding meetings and conferences at 5-star hotels is to be discontinued," expenditure secretary Sushma Nath said on measures to be taken by all central ministries to cut back expenses.

The measures, including cutting down on overtime allowance, domestic and foreign travel expense, publications, professional services, advertising and office expenses, would help the government save an estimated Rs 6000 crore (Rs 60 billion) in the current fiscal.

She also said that a mandatory 5 per cent cut in expenses could be achieved by not increasing budgetary allocation under the heads of non-plan expenditure.

Earlier, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh wrote to ministers asking them to "severely curtail expenditure on air travel, particularly foreign travel, except in cases where it is deemed to be absolutely necessary" in the backdrop of burden imposed on financial resources due to the continuous rising trend in global oil prices and dependence on import of crude.

Nath said the government would stick to fiscal deficit target in 2008-09, despite increased burden due to oil subsidies.

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