'Bahi Khata' instead of 'brief case', Nirmala Sitharaman upholds Indian tradition in budget

Sitharaman was spotted outside the parliament as well as during her customary meeting with President Ram Nath Kovind carrying the budget documents in a red cloth bag.

After former Prime Minister late Indira Gandhi, Sitharaman is the second Union Finance Minister of the country.

This is the first budget to be presented by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government since it came back to power after scripting a massive victory in the Lok Sabha polls.

A day ahead of the Union Budget, Sitharaman on Thursday tabled the Economic Survey which has given a call for a sustained 8% growth rate for India to become a USD 5 Trillion Economy by 2024-25. The government forecast the real GDP growth for the year to 7% percent this year, while being wary of checking the fiscal deficit.

The survey says its theme is about enabling a “shifting of gears”, “to achieve the objective of becoming USD 5 trillion economy by 2024-25, as laid down by the Prime Minister”. It says, for this “India needs to sustain a real GDP growth rate of 8%”. The survey says that it departs from “traditional thinking by advocating a growth model for India that views economy as  being either in a virtuous or a vicious cycle, and thus never in equilibrium”. 

The survey says that it “makes the case for investment, especially private investment as key driver, that drives demand, creates capacity, increases labour productivity, introduces new technology and generate jobs”.  The survey suggests that “Exports must form an integral part of the growth model because higher savings preclude domestic consumption as the driver of final demand.”

The union government on Thursday projected the real GDP growth for the year 2019-20 at 7 per cent on the back of anticipated pickup in the growth of investment and acceleration in the growth of consumption.

“Growth in the economy is expected to pick up in 2019/20 as macroeconomic conditions continue to be stable,” according to the finance ministry’s chief economic adviser, Krishnamurthy Subramanian, who is the main author of the report.