Budget and the growth process

The government's command over household savings needs to be reduced for stimulating demand and private credit

The Union finance minister’s Budget speech indicates seven action areas that are covered mainly by listing about a hundred or so specific projects, old or new. Most of these projects fall within the competence and purview of other ministries. There is no discussion of strategy that could promote these ends through the economy.

This is not to say that the Budget speech should have done that. The main task of the Ministry of Finance is managing public finances and exercising its planning and oversight responsibility over the financial sector. The statement of development strategy and the priorities for public spending that