Opposition parties slam budget as anti-people

The Opposition parties on Friday slammed the Union Budget presented by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee as "anti-people", "lacklustre" and one that would increase the financial burden on the common man.

"The Union Budget does not provide any relief to the common man. It betrays the trust of the common man," BJP spokesman Shahnawaz Hussain told reporters in New Delhi.

BJP leader Ananth Kumar said the budget was "anti-people".

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"It is a purposeless and clerical budget," said CPI leader Gurudas Dasgupta.

"It is a lacklustre budget," said BJD leader Baijayant 'Jay' Panda.

CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury said the budget would increase the financial burden on common man.

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Dubbing the Union Budget as 'anti-people,' Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa said it reflected the 'continued policy paralysis gripping' Manmohan Singh led UPA Government.

"This Budget is an exercise in futility, an ill-wind that blows nobody any good, and to top it all, anti-people... it demonstrates the continued policy paralysis gripping the Union Government," she said.

She said it did not provide any tangible solutions to the problems crippling the Indian Economy" which is at a cross-roads facing insurmountable problems and required 'some bold measures.' The AIADMK supremo said the Budget exercise turned out to be 'Business-as-usual' with some tinkering here and there.

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It did not offer any solution to check slowing economic growth, she said adding the projected growth rate of 7.6 per cent would be difficult to achieve as no real stimulus for growth and sops to private investment had been provided.

"While there has been a lot of tall talk of bringing back the black money stashed in foreign countries for more than three years now, nothing tangible has been done on that count,"  she said.

On the Budget pledging full subsidy support for the proposed Food Security Bill, the AIADMK leader said her government had already opposed the legislation 'tooth and nail' as it will distort the Universal PDS of Tamil Nadu.

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Direct transfer of subsidy on fertilisers to retailers would only cause great harm to the farmers, she added.

Holding that there was no announcement to enable states directly raise resources to implement infrastructure projects, she said the Centre could have created an instrument for raising debt funds to provide support to such projects similar to the infrastructure debt fund to finance Central projects.

"In short, the Budget presented today in Parliament is a poor reflection of the commitment of the Central Government to take the economy forward on a growth trajectory.

BJP described the budget as a mere "accounting statement" sans the big picture which fails to lift the sentiment with regard to the country's "troubled" economy and rued that the Finance Minister has wasted an opportunity to take effective measures to uplift it.

"The Indian economy is passing through challenging times. The sentiment with regard to the economy is low... The Finance Minister wasted a historic opportunity by presenting a non-Budget. His budget is an accounting statement but not a policy enhancing document. It fails to lift the sentiment of the economy," BJP leader and former Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha said.

Addressing a press conference, Sinha insisted that the economy today is in as grim a situation as it was in 1991 when Manmohan Singh had presented his budget as Finance Minister.