 "TMC's last Budget before polls lays focus on job creation, DA hiked by 4%")
The TMC-led West Bengal government on Wednesday tabled the last full budget of its current tenure, claiming that the state’s unemployment rate had dropped to 4.14 per cent against the national rate of about 8 per cent in January 2025, while the state had pulled 92 lakh people out of poverty line up to 2021.
While tabling the ₹3.89 trillion Budget for 2025-26, Minister of State for Finance (Independent Charge) Chandrima Bhattacharya said with nearly 2 crore jobs being created in industry and other sectors, the unemployment rate in the state had come down by 40 per cent.
The state government also announced a 4 per cent hike in dearness allowance for its employees, bringing it to 18 per cent.
Addressing a post-Budget press conference, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said the mission was to create more and more employment.
While presenting the Budget, Finance Minister Bhattacharya said, the government’s policies, programmes and schemes were driven fundamentally by ethos of inclusion of all along with rapid economic growth with equity.
Keeping this vision as a guiding light, she said, the West Bengal economy measured in terms of the gross state domestic product (GSDP) has exceeded ₹18trillion. The GSDP at constant prices has increased by 6.8 per cent in 2024-25 (1st AE).
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She highlighted the recently-concluded Bengal Global Business Summit (BGBS), which claimed to have generated investment proposals worth ₹4,40,595 crore. A state-level investment synergy committee announced at the summit, for clearing investment proposals, has already been formed.
Bhattacharya also said that Asian Development Bank, along with Korea Exim Bank (KEXIM) is providing technical and financial assistance to the government of West Bengal for development of six industrial and economic corridors across the state.
“The industrial and economic corridors will leverage the geographic location of the state and enable West Bengal to emerge as a key manufacturing and logistics hub. The initial project cost will be around Rs 4,400 crore for four corridors,” she said.
At Deocha Pachami, the second largest coal block, basalt mining has already started. The government expects the project along with ancillary industries to create significant employment opportunities.
In the last full Budget before the 2026 elections, the government laid significant focus on rural Bengal -- from road connectivity to housing and river erosion control.
It said that a master plan will be developed to address the issue of river erosion and ₹200 crore has been allocated for this.
Bhattacharya said that rural connectivity has always been a priority for the state government to bring in a multiplier effect on rural economy. For further support, ₹1,500 crore has been allocated under the ‘Pathasree’ scheme.
A major highlight was the Banglar Bari (Gramin) scheme. The state government plans to build 16 lakh new houses for eligible families as part of the second phase and has allocated ₹9,600 crore for this purpose.
Welfare schemes have been the cornerstone of Banerjee’s political success. In sync with the focus, the expenditure towards social service sector (under state development schemes) was projected to increase to ₹99,016.28 crore in 2025-26.
The state is expecting its own tax revenue to grow to ₹1,12,543.80 crore in 2025-26. The revised estimate for state tax revenue was ₹99,863.16 crore.
Given the focus on social sector schemes, the state is planning market borrowing over ₹81,972 crore in 2025-26, projecting the total outstanding debt to go up to ₹7,71,670 crore.