Beware the many slips between cup and lip
What all can come in the way of Budget 2021-22 accelerating India’s economic growth
Every Budget has a vision. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman was clear on what she wanted to achieve as she presented her third Budget on February 1 — create the conditions and impart the necessary impetus for the economy to shrug-off the pandemic and accelerate its growth. She did this by presenting a Budget with a clear direction, high on transparency and conservative in assumptions.
In line with the economic ideology a right-of-centre party would typically adopt, she eschewed hand-outs and opted to revive growth by increasing capital spending and giving a massive push to infrastructure development. Reforms were taken forward. A conscious decision was taken to go slow on fiscal consolidation with the priority being economic growth. This helped her avoid levies that could have otherwise vitiated the investment climate that the Budget sought to create.