Everyone is waiting for February 1, when Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will be presenting her budget for 2022-23. Already, economists have written a lot saying that this is going to be an election budget – or populist, as the Narendra Modi government wants to please people of UP, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Manipur and Goa which elect their new assemblies.
Definitely, the government will not impose any tax burden on the middle class or poor or introduce any reforms that might anger farmers or public sector employees or propose any new restrictions on people like demonetisation etc. On the other hand, the budget will offer more sops to the poll bound states and announce some, please all moves.
But the crucial point here is that most of the announcements made in previous budgets haven’t been translated into reality. For instance, Rs 6,000 crore of allocation for semiconductor chip making in the country, made in the 2019 budget is still on papers. So is the case with several other measures announced during earlier budgets? So, what is the sanctity of these budgets?
In fact, the annual finance bill (as the budget is officially called) is approved by the Parliament and thus becomes an Act. Still, our policy makers don’t attach due respect to them. These budgets are at the best can be described as statements of intentions (SoI) rather than sacred commitments to different sectors and sections of people.
Well articulated piece.
Keep rocking!