Budget 2020-2021
Speech of Nirmala Sitharaman
Minister of Finance
February1, 2020
Hon'ble Speaker,
I rise to present the Budget for the year 2020-2021.
Introduction
In May 2019, Prime Minister Modi received a massive mandate to form the government again. With renewed vigour, under his leadership, we commit ourselves to serve the people of India, with all humility and dedication.
2. People of India have unequivocally given their jan-aadesh for not just political stability and also reposed faith in our economic policies. This is the Budget to boost their incomes and enhance their purchasing power. Only through higher growth we can achieve that and have our youth gainfully and meaningfully employed. Let our businesses be innovative, healthy and solvent with use of technology.
3. For today's youth born at the turn of the century, for every member of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribeswho seeks a better life, for every woman wishing to stand up and get counted, for every individual from the minority sections of our society – this Budget aims to have your aspirations and hopes addressed.
4. We wish to open up vistas for a vibrant and dynamic economy with a gentle breeze of new technology. This vibrant India shall be a caring society which shall attend to its weak, the old and the vulnerable among its citizens.
5. During 2014-19, our government brought in a paradigm shift in governance. This shift was characterised by a twin focus: fundamental structural reform and inclusive growth.
6. Fundamentals of the economy are strong and that has ensured macroeconomic stability. Inflation has been well contained. Banks saw a thorough cleaning up of accumulated loans of the past decade and then they were recapitalized. Companies were provided an exit through the IBC. Several steps on the formalisation of the economy were taken up.
7. Of the structural reforms, the Goods and Services Tax (GST) has been the most historic in our country. Its chief architect is not with us today. I pay homage to the visionary leader late ShriArunJaitleyji. At the time of roll out of GST, he had said and I quote:
'It will be an India where the Centre and States will work harmoniously towards the common goal of shared prosperity. The unanimity of the Constitutional amendment and the consensus of the GST Council highlights that India can rise above narrow politics for the nation's interest. With the GST, neither the state nor the Centre loses its sovereignty. In contrast, they will pool their sovereignty on decisions on indirect taxes.”
8. True to this vision for the historic structural reform, the Goods and Services Tax has been gradually maturing into a tax that has integrated the country economically. It has consolidated numerous taxes and cesses to one tax and facilitated formalization of economy. It has resulted in the efficiency gains in logistic and transport sectors. The turnaround time for trucks has witnessed a substantial reduction to the tune of 20% due to abolition of check posts in GST. The dreaded Inspector-Raj has also vanished.
9. It has also led to significant benefits to MSME by way of enhanced threshold and composition limits. The effective tax incidence on almost every commodity came down substantially. Through several rate reductions, an annual benefit of `one lakh crore has been extended to consumers. It amounts to 10% reduction in overall tax incidence. An average household now saves about 4% on its monthly spends on account of reduced GST rates.
10. During this phase of maturing, GST did face certain challenges. This was natural as transition was daunting. GST Council has been proactive in resolving issues during transition. In the last two years we have added more than 60 lakh new taxpayers, a total of about 40 crore returns were filed, 800 crore invoices were uploaded, and 105 crore e-way bills were generated. There has been extensive engagement with stakeholders. A simplified new return system is being introduced from April 1, 2020.
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