Nirmala Sitharaman is set to present her 8th consecutive Budget
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will be presenting her eighth consecutive Budget today (February 1) at 11 am. This is the Narendra Modi government’s first full-year budget in its third term, being presented amid a slowdown in economic growth to a four-year low.
Presenting this budget will take Sitharaman closer to the record of 10 budgets presented by former Prime Minister Morarji Desai over different periods.
India’s economy is expected to grow in the range of 6.3% and 6.8% in 2025-26 from an estimated 6.4% this year, according to the Economic Survey for 2024-25, tabled in Parliament on Friday. The Congress on Friday said that the Economic Survey was a “powerful indictment” of the Narendra Modi government and its policies.
Referring to the preface to the Economic Survey written by the Chief Economic Adviser, former Finance Minister and Congress leader P Chidambaram said, “After the introductory 10 paras that refer to the difficulties faced by US and Europe, the next 10 paras describe the state of the Indian economy. They are a powerful indictment of the government led by Mr Narendra Modi and the policies pursued so far,” he said.
“Just read these 10 paragraphs and you will know what was wrong with the government during the last 10 years and what needs to be done… His advice to the government to ‘Get out of the way’ is the most sensible piece of advice that I have heard from any government official in the last 10 years,” said Chidambaram.
