What if the name is not found… Finance Minister gave figures in Parliament, said – will you still ask questions?

New Delhi: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, while responding to the discussion on Budget 2024-25 on Tuesday, launched a strong attack on the opposition parties through figures. After the presentation of this budget, most of the opposition parties inside and outside the House said that there is a budget for only two states and the rest of the states were not even named. Nirmala Sitharaman said that the opposition is spreading the misconception that only two states were named in the budget and the rest of the states did not get anything. The Finance Minister gave a figure of the UPA’s ten-year budget from 2004 to 2014 in Parliament. Through these figures, she showed the mirror to other opposition parties including Congress. She said that those who are making these allegations also know what was in their budget.Opposition targeted by UPA government’s budget
Citing statistics, Nirmala Sitharaman said that in the first term of the UPA government in 2004-05, the then finance minister did not name 17 states. Did all those 17 states not get money? Next year, in 2005-06, the names of 18 states were not mentioned in the budget. The next year, in 2006-07, the names of 13 states were not mentioned. After that, in 2007-08, the names of 16 states were not mentioned in the speech and then after that, in the next financial year, in 2008-09, the names of 13 states were not mentioned. In 2009-10, the names of 26 states were not included in the budget, 19 in 2010-11, 16 in 2012-13 and 10 in 2013-14. If the names of the states were not mentioned in the first and second term of the UPA, then did they not get budget?

You have the courage to ask me questions… Nirmala lashes out at TMC
Giving the example of Maharashtra, the Finance Minister said that if its name was not announced in the budget, then was Maharashtra ignored. Rs 76,000 crore has been allocated to Vadhavan port. Targeting TMC, Sitharaman said that yesterday TMC questioned the budget that nothing has been given to West Bengal. Many schemes given by PM Modi have not even been implemented in Bengal and now you have the guts to ask me. The Finance Minister said that due to the government’s better management of the economy and capital expenditure on infrastructure, India achieved high growth after the Covid pandemic and today our country is the fastest growing major economy in the world.

This time the budget for education is more than before
Sitharaman said that not only is our economic growth better but we are also on the path of reducing the fiscal deficit. The country’s gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate in 2023-24 has been 8.2 percent and India has retained the status of the fastest growing major country in the world. She said that we are moving towards the target of bringing down the fiscal deficit to 4.5 percent in 2025-26 under fiscal consolidation. It is estimated to be 4.9 percent in the current financial year. The credit for this goes to better economy management. Rejecting the allegations of opposition parties of reducing allocation for social sectors, the Finance Minister said that the budget document tells the opposite. Rs 1.48 lakh crore has been allocated for the education sector. This is more than the previous financial year.