Emphasis on employment, focus on electoral states… Nirmala’s budget will give an edge to BJP, will it regain the lost support base?

New Delhi: The way BJP remained away from majority in the 2024 election battle, its effect was clearly visible in the Modi 3.0 budget. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented the first budget of the new government on Wednesday. In this budget, she tried to woo the youth and women. Not only this, the issue of employment was raised prominently in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. The Finance Minister also made an important announcement on this. The objective of the budget is believed to be to promote employment generation, attract investment and accelerate overall economic development. This time the budget focuses on major sectors like infrastructure, MSME and rural development. Through this budget, the government is trying to regain the lost support base of BJP. This is because BJP got a tremendous majority in 2019 and 2014. At that time, the role of youth and women was very important in BJP’s spectacular victory. Now the central government has increased special focus on them in this time’s budget.

However, the opposition raised questions on the Union Budget. The opposition refused to accept it as the country’s budget. They say that this time the budget was focused on a few states only. However, when Nirmala Sitharaman held a press conference after the budget, she told what was going on in her mind. Employment generation is considered to be the top priority of the government in this budget. The central government hopes that positive steps have been taken in the budget regarding employment and job growth in the private sector. This will encourage private companies to give jobs to more and more people. However, it will be interesting to see what is the result of this unconventional approach of the budget for job creation.

The country has the largest youth population. In such a situation, dissatisfied youth can be harmful for any political party. Especially when lakhs of them have received college education. In such a situation, Sitharaman put the concerns of the youth first to get back the votes she got in 2014 and 2019. But what will happen if companies do not react positively to the government’s incentive to hire more people? Will this soft attitude of the government turn strict? It remains to be seen.

The budget also shows a clear political plan for the MSME sector. This is because MSMEs are now helped by a friendlier credit loan system. These are reliable job creators. Secondly, because MSME promoters include small businessmen who are believed to be sympathetic to the BJP. In the budget of any coalition government, appeasing allies is always a priority. In this case, Nirmala Sitharaman’s politics is better than the finance ministers of many other coalition governments.

Rather than giving any funds directly to Nitish Kumar and Chandrababu Naidu, this budget allocates capital expenditure for specific projects. This ensures that the help given to allies is in line with the larger focus on building infrastructure. It is also trying to ensure that whatever is allocated is spent optimally. Roads, bridges in Bihar and large irrigation projects in Andhra Pradesh could benefit both politically and economically. Also, it is fiscally prudent.

Women voters, who have been voting in large numbers in every election, are another big political class. The budget has allocated Rs 3 lakh crore in schemes for women and girls. These are likely to be implemented through self-help groups. These schemes aim to double the success of both the beneficiary and the Lakhpati Didi. The 2024 elections showed that the women vote can act as a counter in areas where other voter groups are dissatisfied with the BJP. The investor class will not be very happy with the budget as the burden of capital gains tax benefits has increased. The urban middle class will also be affected by minor changes in income tax. But these are not voting classes. Right now, the BJP wants to get back its lost votes – basically, that is the politics of this budget.

Special focus on ‘Purvodaya’ scheme
The eastern states have many reasons to cheer in this budget. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said a new scheme ‘Purvodaya’ will be rolled out soon with the aim of all-round development of the region. It will include human resource development, infrastructure and creation of economic opportunities to make the region an engine to achieve the goal of developed India. The concept of ‘Purvodaya’ was first mentioned publicly by Prime Minister Modi during a meeting in 2015, when he/she dedicated a refinery of Indian Oil Corporation Limited. he/she had said that for India to become a developed country, the eastern parts of the country will have to be developed. Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said that the people of eastern India have always yearned for development that can bring them at par with the rest of the country. The scheme will ensure that there is a significant increase in infrastructure spending in the region.