What Budget?

REGIONAL ROUNDUP

Jessica Lal, Delhi demolitions, Ottavio Quattrocchhi, the nuclear sovereignty issue, the bird flu.... The build up to the annual Budget exercise hasn't been covered very extensively in the non-English language press anyway, but this year there's been a lot more competition for coverage. Not surprisingly, the Budget coverage has been muted at best.

In the north, Hindi daily Dainik Bhaskar had an anchor piece on the front page reporting there would be little change in the tax structure, and made up for poor coverage on other days in the week by having two edit page articles "" one by former Finance Minister Jaswant Singh, followed the next day with one by former Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha. Sinha wrote about the huge fiscal challenge P Chidambaram faced, given how the deficit needs to be sharply pruned in line with the Fiscal Responsibility Bill and given the huge demands placed on him by the National Advisory Council "" Rs 20,000-40,000 crore for the rural employment guarantee, and Rs 18,000 crore for Bharat Nirman, and a whole lot more.

In the east, Bangla newspapers displayed acute indifference to the Budget. There has been no front page report on what Finance Minister P Chidambaram plans to announce on February 28 in any of the Bangla newspapers. Ananda Bazar Patrika ran some stories on the Budget's likely initiatives on the fringe benefit tax. But these were all carried on inside pages.

In sharp contrast, Bangla newspapers gave the Railway Budget stories more prominence than the Union Budget. This is perhaps a reflection of how railway fares mean more for the common man than the general Budget, whose initiatives on direct or indirect taxes no longer hold any big surprise for the readers. Most readers now expect the indirect taxes to come down and personal income-tax rates to witness marginal changes. In fact, the highlight of reportage in Bangla papers last week was a three-part despatch by Ananda Bazar Patrika's editor on his visit to the Hindu pilgrimage centre in Hinglaj in Baluchistan. Clearly, the Union Budget is not on the agenda. The other reason for the lukewarm response to the Budget could be the impending state Assembly elections, for which an intense contest is on the cards. And the front pages of Bangla newspapers have been full of stories on how the Left parties are planning their electoral battle against the Congress and Trinamool in their bid to retain hold over Writer's Building for a seventh consecutive term.

In Karnataka too, the coverage by the Kannada papers was next to negligible and the press preferred to highlight the bird flu news rather than Budget preparations. However, Prajavani and Vijaya Karnataka published reports on the pending railway projects in the state. Prajavani has also published a report on Sonia Gandhi's suggestions to the Centre on strengthening the tax collection system and implementation of the job guarantee scheme. The Marathi press carried a few pieces on the common man's demands, and did not focus on macro issues like growth and what the Budget could do for it.