FM decides to plump for growth, eases fiscal deficit target to push public investment; significant reforms on black money, ease of business and entrepreneurship
It would seem Finance Minister Arun Jaitley was well aware of the huge burden of expectations he was carrying on his shoulders this time, when he rose to present the Budget for 2015-16. Taking off from the view that the world now thinks it is “India’s chance to fly”, Jaitley put together a Budget which, if one joins the dots, sets the stage for a new economic order in India. Alongside, acutely aware of the need to push growth despite the new GDP calculations, the finance minister has taken the route of pushing public investment for the purpose while veering slightly away from the fiscal consolidation path for the moment.
In many ways, Jaitley has presented a Budget which does not disappoint those who had placed their faith in this being a much more substantive vision statement than the one he presented just after the Narendra Modi government took charge in 2014. Budget 2015 operates on some clear themes, and Jaitley has taken pains to explain not just the challenges he faces but also the key ideas he is banking on. Declining agricultural income, the need for increasing investment in infrastructure, the need to remain on the fiscal consolidation path, a perceptible decline in manufacturing and the impact of the greater devolution of taxes to states have been highlighted in his Budget speech as his major challenges.