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Wednesday, Mar 16, 2005

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Budget against the interests of poor: BJP

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, MARCH 15. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) charged the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance Government, as also its supporters such as the Left parties, on Tuesday of "betraying" the nation by presenting a budget that goes against the interests of the poor, the workers, the farmers, women and the common man.

Initiating the debate on the Union budget in the Lok Sabha, the BJP leader, V.K. Malhotra, said that even as the UPA's common minimum programme (CMP) highlighted certain social sector objectives, the actual allocations made in the budget for several major sectors such as agriculture, irrigation, education, health and the employment guarantee scheme, have been "miniscule".

`Taken away'

Mr. Malhotra said the tax structure announced in the 2005-06 budget took away more than it gave, while offering nothing to the senior citizens and women tax payers. "What was given by the NDA Government was also taken away," he said. Office canteens and barber shops had also been brought under the service tax net, he added. While it was being professed that more credit was being given to farmers who were "committing suicide due to growing indebtedness", in actual fact, only Rs. 9,000 crores was allocated to the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme.

Charges countered

The Congress member, Jyotiraditya M. Scindia, countered Mr. Malhotra's charges. The economy inherited by the UPA from the NDA "was in a total mess," as throughout its tenure, "out of Rs. 100 spent, only one rupee went to education and 34 paise went to the health sector," he said.

The UPA Government, Mr. Scindia said, had beefed up the economy in the past nine months and was leading it to a path of growth.

Even while hailing the budget for its new direction, the CPI (M) member, Rupchand Pal, pointed to sectors such as textiles and jute for focused attention. Questioning the Centre's efforts on raking in more foreign direct investment (FDI), Mr. Pal raised the issue of following a privatisation policy, especially when state-owned banks, oil majors and power utilities like NTPC were making profits. Claiming that his party was not against FDI, he said, "It should be seen in whose interests these reforms are and in what direction they are headed."

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