Captain Amarinder Singh described it as a hogwash, with nothing for the farmers and youth, while putting more burden on the common man...

Chandigarh, February 1: Trashing the Union Budget for 2019-20 as a ‘jumla budget’ of the Modi government, Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh on Friday described it as a hogwash, with nothing for the farmers and youth, while putting more burden on the common man. Reacting to the last budget of the ‘jumla sarkar’, the Chief Minister said it was an election-centric budget aimed at misleading the people with false promises, which were not backed by numbers.

Though ostensibly a populist budget, it was a typical budget of a government on its last legs, with nothing except fake promises for the people of India, said Captain Amarinder Singh, rejecting it as all fluff and no action. The Chief Minister termed the Rs 6000 a year announced for marginal farmers as mere peanuts. With just Rs 500 a month for the distressed farmers, the Modi government had made it obvious that they did not recognise the gravity of the problem, said Captain Amarinder Singh, dubbing the exercise as a mockery of the interests of the farming community.

Union Budget for 2019-20

“They had promised Rs 15 lakhs in accounts of all but have ended up giving only Rs 6000 a year to farmers up to 2 hectares of land, and that too at the end of their tenure, clearly showing their lack of intent to do anything for the farmers’ welfare,” the Chief Minister said. Even the MSP of 50% above the production cost was nothing but an eyewash as the government was not buying all the items on the list, he said, pointing out that while Maize had an MSP it was not being bought by the government, forcing the farmers to sell it at an abominably low cost.

The entire budget, said Captain Amarinder Singh, was in ‘future tense’, as it talked about a USD 5 trillion economy in five years and a USD 10 trillion economy in the next eight years. Nowhere did it reflect the achievements of the BJP-led NDA government of the past five years, he added. The Government had also breached healthy norms of constitutional propriety by announcing concessions for the future with a clear eye on elections, even while it was expected to propose a mere vote on account.

Jumla Budget a Mockery of Farmers

The Chief Minister flayed the budget as a mismatch one, noting that the concessions given to the tune of Rs one lakh core should actually mean an incremental deficit of 0.5% but the government had shown additional deficit of only 0.1 %. This means at least Rs 80,000 crore worth of taxes will be imposed in the full budget, resulting in more burden on the common man in the coming days, he added.