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"On the whole, the budget touches and deals with the critical issues of the macro imbalance...It holds out a lot of other possible initiatives which over time could have very positive effects on the economy," Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia said.
In an interview to a television channel, Ahluwalia said FM has done a fairly responsible approach on the expenditure front and there is a lot of stability on the taxation front.
"...The central message that the budget speech gave is that we must now gear up to get the growth rate back," he said.
As far as the increase in planned spending is concerned, compared with the expenditure that ministries were actually able to do in the current year, the increase provided is very substantial.
"I am reasonably certain that this will be achieved and it was a simple reason what the Finance Minister has actually emphasised in his bilateral discussions and we have been also emphasising," he said.
The reason different ministries do not manage to spend is not because they are not getting forest clearances and so, it is just that they do not get their act together.
