Nirmala Sitharaman, the Union Finance Minister, on the 23rd of December, concluded the pre budget 2021-2022 meetings.
Ms. Sitharaman was conducting the pre budget meeting for the financial year 2021-2022 with stakeholders, farmer bodies, economists, industry bodies and others.
The meeting with several groups were started from the 14th of December and continued till the 23rd of December.
The consultation meetings were held in virtual mode due to the Novel Coronavirus or COVID-19 pandemic.
According to the Finance Ministry, over 170 invitees representing 9 stakeholder groups participated in 15 meetings scheduled during this period.
The stakeholder groups include, Financial and Capital Markets, Health, Education and Rural Development, Water and Sanitation; Trade Union and Labour Organization, Industry, Services and Trade; Infrastructure, Energy and Climate Change sector, Agriculture and Agro-Processing Industry, Industrialists and Economists.
Union Minister of State for Finance & Corporate Affairs Anurag Singh Thakur, Finance Secretary Dr. A.B. Pandey, Secretary to the Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM) Tuhin Kanta Pandey, Secretary of Expenditure T.V. Somanathan, Secretary of the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) Tarun Bajaj, Chief Economic Advisor Krishnamurthy Subramanian and senior officers from the Ministry of Finance and other Ministries also participated in the meeting.
The Ministry said, “The participants lauded the government’s efforts to flatten the COVID-19 curve and a strong recovery in economic growth in the second quarter of 2020-21. They further stated that India is among very few countries whose economic activity has risen with declining pandemic induced fatalities.”
Finance Minister Sitharaman thanked the participants for sharing their valuable suggestions assuring that all suggestions will be carefully considered while preparing the Budget 2021-2022.
According to sources, Ms. Sitharaman indicated the Fiscal Year 2022 budget to focus on infrastructure, which is considered a growth multiplier.
While most economists have projected the economy to contract by 7-9% in 2020-2021, the Finance Ministry expects it to bounce back to grow in double digits in the following year.
Nirmala Sitharaman is likely to present the 2021-2022 Budget on the 1st of December during the Winter Parliament Session.
Stay tuned for further updates
