New Delhi: Soon after Union Minister of Finance and Corporate Affairs Nirmala Sitharaman presented the Interim Budget 2024 in Parliament on Thursday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted a video congratulating the people of India for getting a historical budget. He said the budget was middle-class and farmer-friendly.
Let’s see how others have reacted to the Vote-on-account
Industry leaders
We welcome the Budget. An excellent one. It is a clear outcome-based budget and outlines the path towards Viksit Bharat bringing together growth, social empowerment, and climate. It’s a careful balance between robust investment and fiscal discipline. The budget is exciting, especially the focus on making India greener. It takes the vision of Centre to the states to get on the same momentum.
—Anish Shah, President FICCI
For many years, I have been saying that we create too much drama around the budget and raise expectations of policy announcements to an unrealistically feverish pitch. The Budget is NOT necessarily the occasion for transformational policy announcements. Those can, and should, happen throughout the year. Just as it is for all private households, the Budget is an opportunity to plan our finances prudently and with fiscal rectitude. The more we are focused on living within our means and investing for a robust but sustainable future, the more confidence we will gain with global investors. Which is why I was pleased with today’s budget.
—Anand Mahindra, Industrialist
Ruling Party Members
Her focus on inclusive development and growth reaffirmed Modi Sarkaar’s commitment to the welfare of the Garib, Youth, Nari and Annadata. This budget is a blueprint for the making of Viksit Bharat. It will reinforce trust and confidence in Modi’s Guarantee. A notable feature of the Interim Budget is the stress on new age technologies and data. PM Modi’s message of Jai Anusandhan is a call to our tech-savvy youth.
—Union Minister of Foreign Affairs S. Jaishankar
In the interim budget, you don’t bring any new proposals and it is a process of seeking the approval of Parliament for the expenditure which you have to incur in the next few months as we are going for the next election. Having said that the gist of the budget is what the nation has witnessed in the last ten years “Modi hai to Gurantee hai.
—BJP MP Pratap Rudy
It is a women and people-centric budget. The Prime Minister has always believed that the country has to go forward with women leading the country. The budget has catered to all the sections of people.
—BJP MP Poonam Mahajan
Opposition
It was one of the shortest speeches on Budget records. Not very much came out of it. As usual lot of rhetorical language and very little on implementation. There were hardly any figures. There was no mention of the success or failure of PLAI Scheme which is taking so much money. She talked about foreign investment but did not mention whether it has come down significantly. She did not mention about unemployment, declining female participation in workspace.
—Shashi Tharoor, Congress MP
Nirmala Sitharaman sounded like giving speech in election rally during Budget. BJP has completely missed the economical track.— Sachin Pilot, Congress MP
A disappointing Budget. Corruption and inflation is at the peak in the country and the Budget did not mention any initiative to fight it out. The gender budget every year is only for five per cent while women and girls are half the population of the country. Only 23 per cent of workforce in the country comprises women and only 10 per cent of startups and 20 per cent MSMEs are owned by them. The Budget did not have anything to increase their participation.
— Swati Malliwal, Aam Aadmi Party MP
The Finance Minister took a long time to hail praises but delivery was zero. Nothing much has happened in the last 10 years. The people of the country are already disappointed. Moreover, you realise that performance incentives are given to the bridge companies, and not going to the deserving ones.
—Dayanidhi Maran, DMK MP
There is nothing in it for the poor, women and youth. The government has poured cold water on people on this winter day.
– Priyanka Chaturvedi, Shiv Sena Rajya Sabha MP