A Budget for the Cronies

Even a cursory glance at Budget 2022-23 should be sufficient to convince one that it is an exercise to appease capitalists with a rhetorical promise of creating two crore jobs. No concrete measures have been envisaged to fulfill this promise. At a time when catastrophic changes have taken place in the labour market—both due to the pandemic and paradigm shift in technology—one would have expected generation of employment to have been accorded the top priority. The nearly 25 per cent cut in the allocation for Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) is the unkindest cut at a time when labourers returning from megacities are falling back on agriculture and looking for rural jobs.

Even in matters of allocation for the Health sector, the Centre plans to spend Rs. 41,011 crore against the current year’s expenditure of Rs. 74,820 crore. Though the drastic cut may be explained in terms of lower requirement for Covid-19 vaccination (Rs. 39,000 crore was set apart in the last budget), health experts had expected special dose of allocation now that the decrepit state of the health system across the country has been exposed in full public view. National Tele-Mental Health Scheme is the solitary new scheme announced in the Budget which skips any update on PM Atma Nirbhar Swasth Bharat Yojana announced with great fanfare last year.

The proposal for a 35 percent increase in spending mainly on infrastructure seems to have missed some essential lessons. It was only last week that hundreds of youth demanding access to jobs in the Railways in Patna set an entire train aflame. But it seems the Modi Government has paid no heed to the apparent contradiction between allocating large sums for infrastructure and turning a deaf ear to the cries for employment by jobless youth. The Government labours under the misbelief that a big push for infrastructure—what the Modi Government terms seven engines—rail, road, ports, waterways, airports, mass transport and logistics infrastructure—would expand the economy. Urban youth longing for an urban counterpart of MGNREGS since long, have reason to remain sullen for another year to come. The capital-intensive projects are indeed part of the dream of a Prime Minister whose appetite for technology refuses to be satiated. But one could question if there is a guarantee that these would not be turned over to the private sector once his government goes for a second phase of monetization of public assets.

Some features are, for sure, laudable. The import substitution in matters of Defence equipment stands out as a glowing hallmark of the Budget. The proposed earmarking of 68 per cent of armed forces capital procurement to domestic industry is significant. But on a larger plain, the Budget fails to address the mounting discontent over glaring inequality that has further worsened during the pandemic as was highlighted by the recently released Global Inequality Report. The Budget disappoints those who expected new taxes on wealth and the wealthy to bridge the yawning chasm between the rich and the poor.