Budget 2021 Highlights: The Union Budget 2021-2022 will be presented on February 1. According to PTI, the CCPA has said the Budget will be presented on February 1. President Ram Nath Kovind will address a joint sitting of both the Houses of Parliament on January 29. The Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs
(CCPA) also recommended that the budget session be held from January 29 to February 15. The second part of the budget session will be held from March 8 to April 8. According to Union Minister of Parliamentary Affairs Pralhad Joshi, the Budget Session will commence from January 29 and the first part of it will conclude on February 15. "In the first part, Budget and President’s address will be there, necessary bills will be taken and there will be question hour as well as zero hour," he told ANI.
Expectations
COVID-19 and its spread have left a devastating trail of destruction across the economic landscape, blowing into smithereens the very framework of orthodox fiscal policy planning. The lockdowns and the prolonged restrictions have forced many a company to shut or curtail operations, lowering the government's tax collections. Gross domestic product (GDP)—the total value of goods and services produced in the country—fell 23.9 percent in April-June 2020, and then again by 7.5 per cent in July-September.
India has now slipped into a technical recession, which takes place when real or inflation-adjusted GDP contracts in two successive quarters. From being toasted as an engine for global growth with the status of the world’s fastest-growing major economy, India’s GDP has fallen for two successive quarters. The bigger question now is: how long will the impact last? Will it last for months or for years, if social distancing measures need to be kept in place for protracted periods?
Expectations are running high on the Budget 2021-22 for “big-bang measures." The Union Budget may just be the right occasion to be a little more courageous and to press the foot on the accelerator.
Full coverage of Budget 2021