Budget Analysis: Budget could have been worse, but FM delivered: Bharti Ent

Given that this was UPA’s last Budget before general elections, it could have been worse, but Chidambaram has done better than our expectations, Rakesh Bharti Mittal, vice-chairman and MD of Bharti Enterprises said in an interview to CNBC-TV18.

Below is the edited transcript of Rakesh Bharti Mittal’s interview with CNBC-TV18. Q: Given the constraints both political and fiscal do you believe that the FM has done what he could have done or do you think he could have done better? A: He has done better than what we expected because in an election year Budget could have been worse. If I look at the total out given expenditure going up by 16 percent and one third of that planned expenditure up by 29 percent is a huge positive because that is where the public investment is going to come. More importantly Rs 80,000 crore for rural development, farm credit going up to Rs 7 lakh crore is a huge positive for the farmers. And also the subvention scheme is a positive. Q: Do you believe as far as agriculture is concerned there are enough levers in this Budget to actually able to move agricultural growth rate? A: Partly yes and partly no because I don’t see policy decisions which we don’t expect in the Budget and I only wish that this happens where private sector investment is brought into agriculture. That is something which will move the needle. Whatever is being done now is only going to sustain that. The productivity of pulses and other crops has gone up. For agriculture it is positive and for education it is very good.