India Budget '06

This budget is a bit more than a normal budget. That's all. Not an extra-ordinary one.

PC has proved to be a bit different from other congress ministers. Yet, at the end of the day, he too is a politician. Even after 2 years, he is still circastic and cynical about the NDA govt and its finance ministers. He shud be greatful that he inherited a booming economy and a record high GDP. anyhow... here are my genuine comments on the budget 2006.

Before that, I have a confession to make. I am not an economist nor a specialist in fiance and business. I am just another common man interested in the India Inc's performance and the country's growth.

There are a lot of good news as well as some bad news.

Lets see the good things first ...

An Investors Protection Fund will be set up and funded by fines and penalties to safeguard the interests of retail investors. --- might see a lot of conveninec stores soon in india

Creation of textile parks on the bill. Government also announced setting up of 12 textile industry parks of which 7 have been approved and ten more in the pipeline. --- the WTO has removed the quota based allotment and has made textile a free market. anyone can compete from mar 1st 2005. Now, this will improve our share of the world market

Coal to be deblocked for captive power projects till 2012 --- might attract private partnership ... But still it is not opening it up to FDI. this is a good move, but, wont help us... can't be called as any ground breaking and all..

To double world export share to 1.5% by FY'09 --- ambitious ? No. -- Yet this is significant. Our population is 16.7% of the world. We should atleast aim at reaching 1/3rd of it. sat atleast 5%. But, none have mentioned it till date. Atleast PC takes the credit of setting some goal.

Indian Infrastructure Investment company to be established -- significant move. The SEBI, TRAI, etc were created like this.. Today they have regulated the investment, telecom ... this could also lead to such a market regulator.

Record 34,000 MW to be added under 10th plan 82 projects to be completed in 1-2 years --- ambitious. - Lets see how we achieve it.

Manufacturing and industrial townships to follow cluster model --- followed by the STP and SEZ, they are coming up with a similar model for manufacturing... the textile parks are also in this design.. good move

Banking Sector Reforms: K P Narasimhan committee for Insurance sector has suggested news bills which Govt will introduce in the parliament. --- banking is one sick industry in India. The largest Indian bank the SBI is nowhere in the top 50 banks in the world. It is a distant 84th. It is not even in the top 10 banks in Asia. That needs to be freed from the govt clutches. Hope they will be th enext to take off.

Road development program for the North East sector pegged at Rs 550cr. --- very good. The NE states don't feel being a part of the main stream India. Hope these link them both economically and culturally. Moreover, currently the trucks from Orissa are passing thro' bangladesh to reach the NE states. Whether it reduces the time or not... We need to be self reliant. We need to have the solution and then give the option to the trasnporters.

Food processing to be a priority sector for bank loans. --- good. The food processing units need a boost. The packaging, preserving, processing units need to mushroom as SSI first. Which will not only improve the exports, but also employ a significant amount of Human resource.

Mumbai Metro Rail and Bangalore Metro Rail as well as Metro in Hyderabad are under consideration. --- Consideration ??? Is it a good news or bad ... Hope people like Deva Gowda don't play spoil sport with this project too...
96 percent of Golden Quadrilateral to be completed by June 2006 --- good that PC is apolitical with GQ this year.

North East Budgetary provision up 9 times to Rs 18,696 crore. --- very good again. This will integrate the NE with the main land.

A massive immunization program to be launched to eradicate polio completely by 2007.
Gold Units -- Using gold and trading it as equivalent as mutual funds -- Nice move. But, given the traditional mindset of Indians, it will take a bit time for this scheme to bear fruits...

No new personal tax being laid...

Refinery sector to get boost, will promote FDI --- seekirame chivas regal, indialerndu japanukku export aagalam... don't be surprised...

Much more are there for other sectors too.

-----------------------------------

Now the bad news...

Donations to only religious institutions will be exempted from tax. -- Other old age, orphanage and eudcational trusts shud also be excluded. Whay only religious institutions ?

Merit based scholarships of 20,000 schemes for minority students. -- shud be for economically weak students. They first introduced the mandal comission for 10 years. then the NDA extended it for another 10 years... now congress is again introducing schemes like this.. its high time, everyone stop this vote bank politics...

central assistance for recruitment and posting of Urdu language teachers. Why Urdu alone ? why this bias ? or is this appeasement ?

pre-examination coaching of candidates belonging to the minority communities --- this shud again be for economically backward community who have a good educational track record.

Budget has not insisted in Manufacturing on a large scale other than proposing cluster models for the manufacturing sector.

Iron and steel, Coal, Mining, Ship building --- none of them find any place in the budget.

this list is also a bit long.. yet, don't have the time to write everything... will try to do so later ...