Yashwant rubbishes PC's budget

Taking a dig at this year's Union Budget, former Union finance minister and senior BJP leader Yashwant Sinha said that that the budget will create a liability of Rs 2,00,000 crore for 2008-09.

He pointed out that apart from Rs 60,000 crore loan waiver for farmers declared by the finance minister P Chidamabaram, there would be an additional burden of Rs 30,000 crore for the Sixth Pay Commission and Rs 1,10,000 crore liability due to the subsidies in oil, fertilisers and food "� all not reflected in the budget's deficit.

Referring to the contentious issue of loan waiver for farmers, Sinha said, "This is the first time in the history of any Union budget in India that any proposal has been announced without any financial back-up. The finance minister is silent on the issue of how the burden of Rs 60,000 crore can be handled. This is like political parties announcing schemes in their manifestos without making any financial commitment."

"Instead of saying 'I rise to present the budget', Chidambaram should have uttered 'I rise to present the election manifesto of the Congress party'", he added in a lighter vein.

Sinha also felt that UPA's populist budget would not bring electoral gains for the ruling coalition.

Citing the example of the VP Singh government which failed to garner votes even after declaring a similar loan waiver scheme for framers, he said, "Declaration of last minute sops has no positive impact on the electoral front. People of the country are wise enough and they are certainly not going to be duped by these populist measures."

Commenting on Pranab Mukherjee's recent statement favouring the Indo-US nuclear deal, Sinha said "The Congress knows that it can now sign the deal as the withdrawal of support by the Left parties at this stage will topple the government, thereby paving the way for early elections. There was no need for the External affairs minister to make such an announcement at a time when the Parliament had to discuss the Union budget as well as the Railway budget."

On the budget's Rs 3,780 crore outlay for multi-sectoral development for 90 minority dominated districts in the country, the former Union minister said, "This is a minority appeasement scheme targeted at no other minority community except the Muslims. It is for the first time a religious angle has been introduced in any budget. We take a strong exception to such communal budgeting which aims at developmental programmes not on the basis of social or economic imbalance but on the basis of religion."

Sinha was there in the city to present his views on this year's Union budget, organised by three different forums- Indian Chamber of Commerce, Merchants' Chamber of Commerce and Swadeshi Research Institute.