Interesting facts about Union Budget

Welcome to some interesting facts on Indian Union Budget:

1- Word Budget: The word Budget has been derived from the French word 'Bougette' meaning 'small bag'.

2- Word Infrastructure: For the first 30 years, the Budget didn't have the word infrastructure. It was introduced in the Budget in the 1900s.

3- Colonial India’s union budget: It was introduced on 7 April 1860 by the East India Company to the British Crown. It was presented by a Scottish Economist and politician James Wilson.

4- Independent India’s budget: It was introduced on 26 November 1947. It was presented by the first Finance Minister R.K. Shanukham Chetty. However, it was a review of the Indian economy and no new taxes were proposed. It is to be noted that almost 46% of the Budget or Rs. 92.74 crores were allocated for the defence services department.

5- Printing of Budget: It was first printed from Rashtrapati Bhawan but shifted to government press following a lead of budget in 1950.

6- Multi language: At the beginning, it was only printed in English, but from 1955-56 the Budget documents are printed both in English and Hindi.

7-Prime Minister to present budget: Jawaharlal Nehru was the first PM to present the Union Budget for the FY 1958-1959. The Union Budget is usually presented by the Finance Minister. Other than Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi were the only Prime Ministers who presented the budgets. Indira Gandhi was the first woman to present the budget.

8- Maximum Union Budgets by a Minister: Former Finance Minister Moraji Desai presented the Union Budget a record 10 times, followed by former FM P. Chidambaram (9), former FM Pranab Mukherjee (8), former FM Yashwant Sinha (8), and former FM Manmohan Singh (6)

9- Black Budget: in 1973-74 , then Finance Minister Yashwantrao B chawan presented his budget just after Indo Pak war of 1971, with budget deficit of Rs 550 Crore, highest till that time. This budget is called as black budget. This budget is failed.

10- Epochal Budget: 1991-92 budget presented by then Finance Minister is called as Epochal Budget, as it market the economic liberalisation.

11- Dream Budget: 1997 -98 budget presented by then Finance Minister P Chidambaram is called as dream budget, as it lowered the tax slabs of personal and corporate taxes.

12- Change in time: Usually the budget was presented at 5 PM but in the year 1999, Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha changed the time for the presentation of the Union Budget to 11 a.m.

13- Merging of Budgets and Change in date: In the year 2017, the Rail Budget was merged with the Union Budget. Also, since the said year, the Budget has been presented on 1 February following the changes introduced by the then Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.

14- Gift Tax: Gift tax introduced in 1958-59 to plug the hole of tax evasion.

15- Goods and Services Tax: On 28 February 2006, Goods and Services Tax was introduced by the then Finance Minister P. Chidambaram in the Budget, but it has got implemented in 2016.

16- Longest Budget speech: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman holds the record of delivering the longest Budget speech in 2020-- 2 hours and 42 minutes long.

17- Bahi Khata instead of a briefcase: In the year 2019, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman replaced the standard Budget briefcase with the traditional 'Bahi Khata' with the National Emblem.

18- Paperless Budget: For the first time in Independent India's history, the Budget for FY 2021-22 is paperless.

19- Second Woman to present the Budget: On 5 July 2019, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman became the second woman to have presented the Budget after former PM Indira Gandhi. She is the first full-time woman Finance Minister of India.