-MongabayIndia.com * The main focus of the Union Budget for 2021-22 is on infrastructure development-led growth. * This is expected to create a demand in the Economy and thereby help it recover after the pandemic crisis. * This commentary explores whether the thrust on infrastructure development will lead to adverse environmental consequences. * The views expressed in this commentary are that of the author. Investment in infrastructure is the most important focus area in the...

-The Hindu Even with closures, capex exceeded plan, says Expenditure Secretary Expenditure Secretary T.V. Somanathan said the government has been very careful and realistic in its expenditure and receipts projections for 2021-22, and that its push for capital expenditure is the largest ever over a two-year period. Excerpts: * You have called it an expansionary budget, but overall spending is just about ₹33,000 crore in 2021-22 over this year’s revised estimates (RE). Also,...

-The Indian Express While the government has failed to deliver what was promised through the main budget and subsequent mini-budgets, estimates for next year also point to missed opportunities to use fiscal measures to revive the ailing Economy. Expectations from Budget 2021 were high. Unsurprisingly so, for an Economy battered by two years of slowdown, with a pre-pandemic annual growth rate of 4 per cent being a decadal low and the subsequent...

-Hindustan Times Several announcements — a bad bank, the proposal for a development financial institution, and bank recapitalisation — aim at reforming the Economy. But these will not respond to the structural inequalities caused by the pandemic Covid-19 is a crisis like no other. And, expectedly, it has wreaked havoc on the Government of India (GoI)’s financial arithmetic as it struggled to deal with collapsing tax revenues and increased expenditure pressures. Therefore,...

-The Indian Express The budget should have shown how serious it was about inclusive growth by announcing direct cash support to informal workers, circular migrants, agricultural labour, in addition to steady in-kind food transfers from the overflowing coffers of the FCI by making PDS universal. India’s annual budget, announced amidst much anticipation, focused on health as one of its key pillars. The fact that health and “inclusive growth” found their way into...