India Budget 2008-09 - A Critical Look

Is the government undertaking the right programs?

In budget, the programmes of the government are announced. Has it selected the right programmes.

1. Public transport systems - The required emphasis was not given.

In Mumbai we fear to travel in local trains nowadays even on a Sunday. The finance minister said that he is a lucky man and country progressed a lot under him and he got a lot more tax revenue.

Why is he still allowing Mumbai people to suffer. When times are good, if he forces us to endure the hardship when is the government going to improve things.

Not only travel in Mumbai, travel to many places is very difficult.

Recently I travelled by Devagiri Express to Secunderabad. On the way at most of the stations, persons enter the sleeper compartment and trouble long distance passengers. Why are they doing it? Because they cannot enter the compartment meant for short distance travellers so called general compartment.

Government pats itself saying that they had achieved great things. Have they made the correct choices?

Hyderabad is also having traffic problems and Bangalore is also in a similar situation or probably in a much worse situation.

2. Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises - As the growth agricultural production is meagre, there is a need to encourge micro enterprises in rural areas as well as urban areas and provide alternate means of employment and livelihood to people engaged presently in agriculture related occupations.

Has the budget recognised the issue and annouced any programmes? Item number 89 deals with it in the budget.

89. Micro, small and medium enterprises will continue to receive support from the Government. I wish to remove certain wrong perceptions about the sector. In the four years ending 2006-07, for which figures are available, there has been a secular rise in the number of registered units, the number of unregistered units, production, employment and exports. In order to give a fillip to the sector, I propose to create a risk capital fund in the Small Industries and Development Bank of India (SIDBI). As on January 31, 2008, the Credit Guarantee Trust with SIDBI had extended guarantees to 89,129 units for an amount of Rs.2,479 crore. SIDBI will reduce the guarantee fee from 1.5 per cent to 1 per cent and the annual service fee from 0.75 per cent to 0.5 per cent for loans up to Rs.5 lakh.

Does this statement convey any vision? Does it have any target in relation to growth of this segment and employment in this segment?

Courtesy : indeco-news.blogspot.com