Union Budget 2023: The Union Budget of India is an annual financial statement presented by the Finance Minister of India in the Parliament. It is known as the Annual Financial Statement according to Article 112 of the Constitution of India. It outlines the government's revenue and expenditure for the upcoming financial year, as well as its plans for taxation and public spending. The budget also includes projections for the Indian economy and its various sectors, such as agriculture, industry, and services. The Union Budget serves as a blueprint for the government's financial and economic policies for the next 12 months and is considered one of the most important financial events in India.
To ensure that it is implemented before the start of the new fiscal year in April, the government presents it on the first day of February. The first Union budget of independent India was presented by R. K. Shanmukham Chetty on November 26, 1947. Union Budget 2023-23 will be presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on 1 February 2023. This will be her 6th budget presentation as the Finance Minister.
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In this article, we have answered 6 amazing questions based on the Union Budget of India.
Question.1. If Hindi is our national language, why is the budget in Parliament presented in English?
Ans. Hindi is not our national language and is one of many official languages of India. There are 22 official languages used by the states, including English, Assamese, Bengali, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Maithili, Malayalam, Marathi, Punjabi, Sanskrit and Urdu. Every Indian state is free to use its own official language.
But in Parliament, most of the Members of Parliament are comfortable with English as they come from different states and have different native languages, and English is known to almost everyone.
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You must have seen politicians sitting in the parliament bearing an earphone. Actually, this earphone has the ability to translate the language from English to Hindi and vice-versa. Since 1955-56, the Budget documents are printed both in English and Hindi.
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2. When was the first Union Budget of India presented?
Ans. The first Finance Minister of independent India was R. K. Shanmukham Chetty. He presented the first Union budget of India on 26 Nov.1947. The first mini-budget was presented by T. T. Krishnamachari on November 30, 1956.
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3. While going to present the budget in the parliament, what does Finance Minister carry in their briefcases?
Ans. The tradition to bring a briefcase to the present budget started around 1860 when William Ewart Gladstone was the Chancellor of the Exchequer in Great Britain. He was notorious for presenting very long budget speeches which lasted 5 to 6 hours.
Since such long budget speeches required lots of files & documents, he felt the need for a box to organize and carry them to the parliament (House of Commons). That is why a briefcase called the “Budget Box” was presented to him by the Queen for this purpose.
In the year 2019, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman replaced the Budget briefcase with the traditional 'Bahi Khata' having the National Emblem.
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4. Why Indian Budget is always made a Budget for the deficit?
Ans. As we know India is a welfare state and the government works for the welfare of its citizens. Thus, when the government expenditure exceeds its revenue, a deficit is created in the economy through printing more currency and borrowing from other countries.
Thus, the lack of revenue from the central government is the basic reason behind the formation of the deficit budget.
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5. Why Budget is called Union Budget?
Ans. India is a Union of states. In any federation, there are two main entities, federal states, and the centre. India has a stronger centre with less strong federal states. The centre is called a Union in our constitution, hence, the union's budget is called the “Union budget”.
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6. Why the Budget was presented digitally in Parliament?
Ans. FM Sitharaman presented the first paperless Budget in FY 2023-24 keeping in view the COVID-19 pandemic. Like the previous year, the Budget is expected to be paperless.
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