Friday, 02 February 2024 | PNS | DEHRADUN
The Uttarakhand Congress has termed the interim budget 2024-25 presented in the parliament by Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday as directionless and anti-people. The Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) president Karan Mahara said that the Union government has shown its obstinate behaviour in the budget which is anti development, inflationary and retrogressive. He said that the budget lacks vision and the finance minister has done jugglery with data in the budget. Mahara added that the budget also lacks financial management and will add the burden on the common man already reeling under the menace of price rise.
The PCC president said that poor budgetary provisions will ensure that the growth rate will not touch the double digit growth rate and the employment opportunities will not be created. He said that after talking about doubling the income of the farmers the government is now talking about doubling the income of the common man but no provisions have been made in the budget for this. Mahara said that in view of the upcoming elections of Lok Sabha, the government has gone on a freebie distribution spree. He said that the finance minister has only made declarations but has made no mention of provisions for fulfilling the promises. Mahara said that the budget will provide benefits only to capitalists. He also claimed that Uttarakhand has been left high and dry in the budget.
The leader of opposition (LoP) in State assembly Yashpal Arya said that while the capitalists will become further rich from the union budget there is nothing for the general public in it.
He said that it was expected that the Finance minister would tell the nation about the employment the BJP government was able to generate in the last 10 years and the status of Startup India and Make in India initiatives but she evaded these subjects. Arya said that the employees were hoping that the government would restore the Old Pension Scheme (OPS) but their hopes were also dashed. He said that the hands of Uttarakhand were left empty handed again in the budget and mention of green bonus and disaster package for Joshimath was made in the budget. Arya said that the farmers and unemployed also got nothing in the budget and the BJP government has made a record of completing a decade of dishing out anti-people budgets.
