Nirmala Sitharaman to beat Morarji Desai’s record of presenting highest number of budgets
The first budget of independent India was presented by then finance minister RK Shanmugam Chetty on November 26, 1947, for ₹197.1 crore
Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman will create a record of presenting the highest number of Union budgets on Tuesday when she presents her seventh budget in Parliament, beating former finance minister Morarji Desai’s record of six. Desai was finance minister under prime ministers Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi and he later became the Prime Minister of India in 1977.
The first budget of independent India was presented by then finance minister RK Shanmugam Chetty on November 26, 1947, for ₹197.1 crore. It grew to ₹47.65 lakh crore in the last financial year.
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Earlier, the presentation time of the budget was 5pm. However, then finance minister Yashwant Sinha opted for an 11am slot for budget presentation in 1999, which has been continued so far.
The data available with the Lok Sabha secretariat shows that there have been instances when the Prime Minister and not the finance minister presented the general budget.
“India’s first PM Jawaharlal Nehru presented the budget for the financial year 1958-59 while acting as Prime Minister and temporarily handling the finance portfolio,” said a document from Lok Sabha. Indira Gandhi tabled the Budget for FY1969-70 while acting as the Prime Minister after the resignation of finance minister Morarji Desai.
In 2019, “due to ill health of the then finance minister Arun Jaitley, the budget for that year was presented by his colleague minister Piyush Goyal,” said the document.
The Railways was the only ministry that had its separate budget, but it was merged with the general budget in 2017.
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After the presentation of the Budget in the Lok Sabha, the finance minister also tables the budget papers in the Rajya Sabha—even as the Upper House doesn’t have any jurisdiction to approve or disapprove the Budget.
The Budget discussions are followed by debates on ministry-specific allocations or Demand for Grants. At the end of the discussions on Demand for Grants, all such demands are taken up together and passed through a process called Guillotine.
As mentioned earlier, the Rajya Sabha doesn’t have power to alter or reject the budget. After the debate on the budget in the Upper House, the House refers the budget to the Lok Sabha.