Soponomics

Can the Modi government fund the bonanza of sops for voters without wrecking the country's financial stability?

- Prosenjit Datta

Budget speeches in India, since the 90s, have rarely been about a simple laying out of revenue and expenditure statements of the government for the coming year. They have been used to announce major policy shifts, signal the government’s priorities for the coming year, and sometimes, to boast about the government’s achievements and pitch for re-election.

Interim Finance Minister Piyush Goyal’s maiden Budget speech was an unabashed pitch for bringing the Modi government to power, not just for one additional term of five years, but till 2030.

It was the longest interim Budget speech on record because a good part of it went into boasting about the government’s achievements and also about laying out the vision for the next 10 years if the BJP under Modi were to be re-elected.

Unlike most Budget speeches of the decade, which have often digressed into banalities or tried to cover too wide a ground and appeal to too many people, this had a sharp focus – aimed at farmers and the poorer workers who have made their disenchantment felt strongly, and at the lower end of the tax payers, who have been vocal about bearing the burden without getting any reward. The rest of the speech essentially fell into two brackets. The first was a listing of the government’s achievements (macro economic stability achieved by bringing down inflation and deficits, maintaining high growth, Swacch Bharat, various PM Yojanas and about the landmark laws passed – Goods and Services Tax and Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board. The second part was a listing out of the vision for the next 10 years, which was nothing more than a rewording of the BJP’s 2014 pre-election manifesto with some minor tweaks.