Budget bypasses the most pressing issues

After Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman completed her Budget speech on Thursday, there were many who rushed to compliment the BJP led National Democratic Alliance(NDA) government at the Centre for not falling for the ‘populist Budget’ bait in an election year and instead, doling it out big for housing, the defence sector and for school education.

They probably have forgotten the fact that there are millions of common citizens out there who were looking for some respite from the FM in the form of a cut in personal tax rates, a comprehensive job scheme to push employment in an otherwise bleak scenario, a price control mechanism to keep the prices of farm commodities and food grains under check and higher subsidies for the food and fertilizer sectors.

Instead, Ms Sitharaman mercilessly cut the food and fertiliser subsidy which is sure to have its impact on the prices in these vital sectors.

She had no innovative proposals to present which would spur employment in either the urban or rural context in a particularly depressing world scenario with raging wars threatening to drastically affect economic prospects.

What she had to say was that the disinvestment target of companies would go up from Rs 30,000 crore in the revised estimates to Rs 50,000 crore now, which is sure to jeopardise the jobs of many in public sector units.

She also did not forget to make grandiose announcements that as many as 11.8 crore farmers had received government assistance under the PM Kisan Yojana and that 25 crore people had been freed from poverty.

There was no change in the tax rates either which came as a severe blow for the middle class and salaried class which were fervently hoping that some relief would come their way in the form of an Income Tax cut.

Ms Sitharaman’s Budget speech has obviously left no ground for her critics to blame her for treading the populist path by announcing bombastic schemes but does it have anything new to offer to India’s teeming millions waiting for freedom from grinding poverty and trying desperately to secure jobs amid a bleak economic scenario?

One interesting proposal which stood out in the Budget was the move to build 2 crore more rural houses but then houses alone cannot be solace for those who are often left wondering where their next meal will come from.

As for the life-saving Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), the allocation remains unchanged pointing to a an inexplicable lack of interest on the part of those in power to make this scheme more viable and attractive.

There have been Budgets in the past which had helped spur economic growth and alleviated the misery of the most deprived; there have been ingenious proposals which unleashed the hidden potential of several sectors of the economy and led to more job and wealth creation.

Nothing of that kind is visible in the current Budget which seems to have confined itself to upping and cutting allocations and announcing some lackluster schemes which would hardly make a difference in current conditions.

Is this because the ruling BJP is supremely confident that whatever the budget proposals may be, there is nothing that can stop them from sweeping back to power in the Parliament polls due in two months from now?

With Opposition unity in tatters amid an air of increasing despondency, it is more than evident that not much attention has been paid to comprehensively tackle problems like unemployment, rising prices, soaring inequality and rural distress in the Budget.

All that one needs to do to sum up Ms Sitharaman’s budget in a nutshell is to recall the brilliant words of Greek thinker Plato that ‘The worst form of injustice is pretended justice.