Ranjit K. Jain
| Photo Credit: Special Arrangement

File photo of Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
| Photo Credit: R.V. Moorthy

Representational image of a stock trader looking at a share price on a screen at a brokerage house
| Photo Credit: Vivek Bendre

Trinamool Congress MP Abhishek Banerjee, Samajwadi Party MP Akhilesh Yadav, party MPs Dharmendra Yadav, Dimple Yadav and Anand Bhadauriya in the Lok Sabha during the Budget Session, in New Delhi on February 7, 2025.
| Photo Credit: ANI/Sansad TV

Terming the Union Budget “pro-rich”, Opposition members in the Lok Sabha on Friday (February 7, 2025) urged the Modi government to improve the condition of the common people, farmers and agriculture workers, youth, small and medium enterprises, among others.

Before the discussion on the Budget started, Congress members objected to the absence of Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in the House. “It has been a convention that the Finance Minister is present at the time of the initiating the debate,” party leader K.C Venugopal pointed out.

Stating that there was no such parliamentary rule, the BJP’s Dilip Saikia, who was chairing the proceedings, pointed out that Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary was present in the House.

As the Congress MPs rose to their feet, Speaker Om Birla took over the House proceedings and assured the protesting members that he would “ensure” that whenever Budget discussions took place in future, Ms Sitharaman would be present.

Initiating the discussion on the Union Budget in the Lok Sabha, Congress member from Patiala, Dharamvira Gandhi, claimed the Budget failed to address farmers’ grievances. Expenditure towards health and education was stagnating, he said, adding that the government had tried to maintain fiscal deficit at the cost of social sector schemes.

He also called it “unitary” in nature as the States were “not allowed to participate in the Budget-making process”. “It failed to address the grievances of the farmers,” Mr. Gandhi said, adding that the “misplaced priorities” of the government led to the closure of MSME units across the country.

‘Economic favouritism’

Trinamool Congress MP Abhishek Banerjee alleged that the NDA government had mastered the art of taking away from the poor and giving to the wealthy elite, “the reverse of Robin Hood”.

“For instance, the waiving of corporate loans worth thousands of crores using taxpayers’ money, while poor farmers struggling with debts are left to suffer. The government claims to have no money to increase subsidies on essential commodities, yet it slashes corporate tax rates, giving billionaires an even bigger slice of the pie. This is not economic justice. This is economic favouritism at its worst,” he said.

Congress member from Assam, Pradyut Bordoloi, said the Budget failed to address key issues such as inflation and unemployment, and urged the government to take steps to increase disposable income of the people.

Stating that the tax sops would benefit only two crore taxpayers, he asked the government to expand and strengthen food security, increase allocation to public distribution system (PDS), and universalise free ration distribution for the next two years. “Reduce GST on essentials like food, medicine and medical insurance,” he added

CPI (ML) Liberation MP Sudama Prasad said, “Pro-rich budget has been presented by the government. There is nothing for the poor and youth in the budget”.

Raising the issue of farmer indebtedness, Rajeev Rai of the Samajwadi Party said the government should consider announcing a debt waiver scheme for farmers.

The BJP MP from Jaipur Rural, Rao Rajendra Singh, claimed individual taxpayers had been given benefits of about ₹8.71 lakh crore in the last five years, while the corporate taxpayers got benefits worth about ₹4.53 lakh crore.

Janata Dal (United) MP Alok Kumar Suman and Chandan Chauhan of the Rashtriya Lok Dal said the Budget would benefit all sections of society.

Andhra Pradesh CM Chandrababu Naidu.
| Photo Credit: The Hindu

Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu asserted that the Union Budget presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on February 1 was aimed at increasing the growth rate, for which various policy interventions were laid down. 

Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s leadership, India was poised to emerge as a developed country, he stated. 

Addressing media persons in New Delhi on Monday (February 3, 2025), Mr. Naidu said the world was now closely watching the fast progress being made by India and that he got a sense of it at the recent World Economic Forum, where he showcased the investment opportunities in Andhra Pradesh (A.P.). 

He observed that the focus was earlier on Information Technology (IT) but it has completely shifted to Artificial Intelligence (AI) in recent years. 

India, he pointed out, was well positioned to make its mark in the AI landscape, he opined.

Mr. Naidu recalled that A.P. pioneered reforms in the power sector and, at present, emphasis was laid on improving the business ecosystem with due priority to realising the potential of MSMEs.

He predicted a decisive victory for the BJP in the Delhi polls, while reiterating that the city has been ruined by the Aam Aadmi Party. 

Congress leader Jairam Ramesh. File
| Photo Credit: PTI

The government has only committed to “half-hearted” steps of registering gig workers on e-SHRAM and including them under the Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana, the Congress said on Sunday (February 2, 2025) and asserted that India needs a national legal and social security architecture for such workers.

The Congress’s attack came a day after Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced a social security scheme for one crore gig workers engaged with online platforms and said the government will provide them identity cards and facilitate their registration on the e-Shram portal.

Ms. Sitharaman had said that these workers will be provided healthcare under the PM-Jan Arogya Yojana.

In a post on X, Congress general secretary in-charge communications Jairam Ramesh said the government has finally awoken to the pain of India’s gig workers but has only “committed to the half-hearted steps” of registering them on e-SHRAM and including them under the Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY).

Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi has been a leading voice for India’s gig workers since the Bharat Jodo Yatra, Mr. Ramesh said.

The Congress governments in Telangana and Karnataka, and the former Congress government in Rajasthan, have brought powerful legislation to bring gig workers justice, he pointed out.

Social security for gig workers was also a key guarantee given by the Indian National Congress’s Nyay Patra for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, he said.

The government has a long way to go before catching up to the Congress’s State legislations for gig worker welfare, Mr. Ramesh said.

“For instance, the Karnataka Platform-based Gig Workers (Social Security and Welfare) Bill, 2024 is a landmark rights-based legislation that brings formal rights and social security to platform-based gig workers in the state,” he said.

Citing some key features of the legislation, Ramesh said it establishes the gig worker’s social security and welfare fund as well as the Gig Workers Welfare Board to advocate for workers. It calls for mandatory registration of all gig workers with the government, Mr. Ramesh said.

According to the provisions of the bill, Ramesh said aggregators can no longer terminate a worker without giving 14 days prior notice and a valid reason and aggregators must make payments to gig workers every week.

“As much as state governments can do, India needs a national legal and social security architecture for gig workers. The Union government’s halting steps are far from enough,” Mr. Ramesh asserted.

New Delhi:

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, who presented the Union Budget yesterday, clarified that the asset monetisation plan is not a substitute to disinvestment. 

Speaking to NDTV Editor-in-Chief Sanjay Pugalia on Sunday, Ms Sitharaman said, “Asset monetisation is not a substitute for disinvestment. Asset monetisation has been going on and will continue. In the 2nd edition, we said we will plough back capital of 10 lakh crore in new projects…If there is an asset that we want to monetise with a private party, that won’t be for sale. The ownership will be with the Centre, it won’t transfer. That is not disinvestment. The revenue that we will get, we will plough back.”

“The Centre has not dismissed disinvestment. There is talk of disinvestment as well,” Ms Sitharaman added.

According to Ms Sitharaman, Public Sector Undertakings (PSU) will help in building more assets.

“Every PSU is becoming professional on its own. But the market assessment processes, they do not have it. We are helping towards value addition to assets…Our budget also focuses on meeting urban challenges,” she said.

Ms Sitharaman on Saturday announced the launch of the second Asset Monetisation Plan for the period 2025-30. The plan aims to generate Rs 10 lakh crore by monetising government-owned assets and reinvesting the proceeds into new infrastructure projects. The government will also fine-tune regulatory and fiscal measures to ensure the successful implementation of the plan.

Apart from this, the government also proposed a financial outlay of Rs 1.5 lakh crore for interest-free loans to states. These loans, with a tenure of 50 years, are aimed at boosting capital expenditure and incentivising state-level infrastructure reforms.

Anti-Tobacco activists in Mysuru have expressed their disappointment over the failure of Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s Budget to either increase sin tax or a percentage increase in cess under National Calamity Contingent Duty (NCCD).

In a statement in Mysuru, Convenor of Anti-Tobacco Forum, Mysuru, Vasanthkumar Mysoremath regretted that the “tobacco industry was smiling while every eighth second a person was dying an untimely death due to non-communicable diseases (NCD) like cancer, lung diseases and heart attacks directly attributable to smoking and consuming poisonous tobacco products”.

He contended that India was a signatory to WHO’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) that suggested an increase in taxes to the extent of 75% of the retail prices of all tobacco products to deter their consumption.

“The current tax on cigarettes in the country is 52.7% while it is 22% on bidis and 63.8% on chewing tobacco”, he said. While pointing out that there are 245 million consumers of smoke and non-smoke tobacco products in India, Mr. Mysoremath said even if the Finance Minister had increased tax/duty at ₹1 per stick, millions of rupees would have accrued per day and bolstered the revenue that could have been used for schemes like de-addiction, health services and other social welfare schemes.

“But, unfortunately, the Finance Minister has neglected this golden opportunity”, he said referring to the absence of any mention of levy of sin tax in the Budget 2025-26. The burden on health services due to tobacco related diseases is increasing and “to wipe the tears of cancer patients, the Minister has reduced the cost of cancer drugs”, he observed.

He also regretted the absence of any mention of gradual reduction in cultivation of tobacco crop to contain “the unending deadly raw material supply to the tobacco industry that is making hay while no taxes are proposed to be levied on its products”.

Mr. Mysoremath has urged the Finance Minister to consider the observations of the anti-tobacco forum and propose an increase in the levy of taxes on tobacco products.

The Union Budget for 2025-26, presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday, is a mixed bag for Tamil Nadu.

The DMK government’s slew of requests, including allocation of funds for the Chennai Metro Rail Project and disaster relief, did not find a mention in the Budget speech, while broader measures, including income tax benefits under the New Tax Regime, measures for senior citizens, and measures for footwear and leather sector, are likely to benefit the State.

The State government had been repeatedly seeking release of ₹6,675 crore under the National Disaster Response Fund to meet the temporary and permanent relief and restoration requirements in the aftermath of Cyclone Fengal and allocate ₹10,000 crore in the current year for the Chennai Metro Rail Phase-2 Project and release of ₹2,152 crore pending under the Samagra Shiksha Abhiyaan. Besides, it had also sought a nod for the Madurai and Coimbatore Metro Rail Projects and the announcement of railway projects, including a fourth line between Tambaram and Chengalpattu, and highway projects, including the construction of an elevated road between Tambaram and Chengalpattu (NH- 32) and from Chengalpattu to Tindivanam.

The Union Budget for 2025-26, presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday, is a mixed bag for Tamil Nadu.

The DMK government’s slew of requests, including allocation of funds for the Chennai Metro Rail Project and disaster relief, did not find a mention in the Budget speech, while broader measures, including income tax benefits under the New Tax Regime, measures for senior citizens, and measures for footwear and leather sector, are likely to benefit the State.

The State government had been repeatedly seeking release of ₹6,675 crore under the National Disaster Response Fund to meet the temporary and permanent relief and restoration requirements in the aftermath of Cyclone Fengal and allocate ₹10,000 crore in the current year for the Chennai Metro Rail Phase-2 Project and release of ₹2,152 crore pending under the Samagra Shiksha Abhiyaan. Besides, it had also sought a nod for the Madurai and Coimbatore Metro Rail Projects and the announcement of railway projects, including a fourth line between Tambaram and Chengalpattu, and highway projects, including the construction of an elevated road between Tambaram and Chengalpattu (NH- 32) and from Chengalpattu to Tindivanam.