By Budget Team

DOES the FM read his budget? He does – every word of it as certified by Mr. Yashwant Sinha, former FM in the discussions on the 2004 budget. He said, I would like to inform the Minister that I have presented five Budgets; I know how the Budget speeches are prepared and how much time a Finance Minister devotes to every word of the Budget speech, not only every sentence but every word of the Budget speech, and I am unable to accept this as a printing mistake”

Printing mistake in the budget? Yes it happened. In para 102 of his 2004 budget speech, Mr. Chidambaram had said, “Hon’ble Members are aware that I abolished the gift tax in 1997”. This statement was factually wrong. It was Mr Sinha who abolished the gift tax and naturally he did not like Mr. Chidambaram taking credit for it and raised it in Parliament. Mr. Chidambaram was quick to acknowledge and said, “I accept the mistake. Actually, he had abolished the gift tax. I should have said, "You abolished". I accept the printing mistake”. Mr. Sinha was not prepared to accept it as a printing mistake. The indomitable PC had the last word or rather the penultimate word, when he sweetly declared, “You have to accept my word. I corrected it but the correction was not carried out.” The last word of course belonged to Mr. Nilotpal Basu, who quipped about Mr. Sinha, “It is a pity that he didn't have the opportunity to present yet another Budget, and this kind of mistakes could have been avoided perhaps”.

Non application of mind: It is not commissioners alone who are accused of non application of mind. Regarding transaction tax, the former FM remarked, “But I would only like to say that this kind of a proposal should have been thought through. I don't see that application of mind in the imposition of a transaction tax on a 15 basis point because the kind of situation...”

Do FMs fudge figures? They do! according to the former FM. He said, “that the Finance Minister had made claims which are not justified, that the Finance Minister has sought to create impressions which are not borne out by the documents that he has presented to the Parliament, that the Finance Minister has indulged -- every Finance Minister does this, but, not, maybe, to that extent -- in fudging the figures, much out of line both on expenditure and on the revenue fronts.