Jaipur: Bootyful Budget Flags Off Poll Exp

In a bid to score brownie points in the last budget before the assembly polls, Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje attempted to reach out to all sections of the society, with focus on rural areas. 

In her two hour 16 minute long speech, she said, “Small and margnisalised farmers remain among the most vulnerable sections of the society. It has been decided to grant them a one time waiver of up to Rs 50,000 overdue against loan sanctioned to them by cooperative banks. This is estimated to put financial pressure of Rs 8,000 crore on the state government,” said Raje. 

The announcement was accompanied by bench thumping by the ruling party who pledged support for schemes amid protests from the opposition.

The current budget, with an outlay of Rs 107865.40 crore, has allocation of more than 20 per cent compared to the previous budget.  

This time, the share of the agriculture sector has increased to 6.25% while share for rural development rose to 13.42 % this fiscal. 

This will be in addition to the expenditure on these areas under the social and community welfare schemes that have 40.92% share, which is a tad less than the previous budget.  

As the CM went on to pull out more election goodies, the opposition kept lurking for an opportunity to disrupt the budget speech. 

However, the protests got suppressed amid bench thumping by the ruling party members. 

Undaunted by the opposition’s clamour, the Chief Minister recited poetic versus in her signature style to express her determination to succeed beyond difficulties. 

“Manzilen badi ziddi hotee hain, hasil kahan nasseb sey hotee hain, magar wahantoofan bhee haar jate hai, jahan kashtiyan zid par hotee hain,” she told members of the treasury benches thumping their tables.

She made several announcement for senior citizens, farmers, youth, women, businessmen, employees and the common man.

She also declared exemption of ‘lagan’ on land and constitution of Rajasthan State Farmers Debt Relief Commission for settlement of crop loans on merit basis.

Raje said that the government made the dream of the refinery come true and also saved Rs 40,000 crore by re-negotiating the project. She also said that the refinery will create over a lakh new opportunities of employment.

Every time an announcement related to development was made, the BJP MLAs thumped the benches while the Congress legislators remained quiet. Notably, the budget estimated a revenue deficit of Rs 17,454.85 crore budgeting the effect of the UDAY scheme.