Union Budget Completely disappointing for All, especially Telangana: Uttam Kumar

Hyderabad, February 1: Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) President Capt. N. Uttam Kumar Reddy described the budget presented by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Seetharaman on Saturday as highly disappointing, especially for Telangana State.

Uttam Kumar Reddy, in a media statement, said except for some changes in Income Tax slabs, there was nothing new in the budget. “There is nothing in the budget for unemployed youth, farmers, women, students and the sectors that generate jobs have been completely ignored,” he said.

“The budget speech was completely silent on rising unemployment in the country which is at 45 year high. The Finance Minister neither made a mention of unemployment nor proposed any measures to address the problem,” he said. Further, he said there was no mention of rising inflation in the country.”

“The government did not specify as to how it plans to double the income of farmers by 2022. There was no mention of crores of farmers who are in distress due to various factors and the reasons why thousands of farmers were committing suicide. In fact, the Economic Survey 2019-20 report, released on Friday, had a long chapter suggesting that crop loan waiver schemes implemented in the past was bad for the economy”, he said.

“Why the Modi Government is not speaking about MS Swaminathan Report, which it promised to implement to provide input cost + 50% as MSP for agriculture produce?”he questioned.

“The agriculture growth rate must be at least 11% if we wish to double the farmers’ income by 2022. However, as per the Economic Survey 2019-20, the annual growth rate in real terms in agriculture and its allied sectors was 2.88 per cent from 2014-15 to 2018-19 and the estimated growth rate in 2019-20 is 2.9 per cent. The Finance Minister needs to clarify how the government plans to achieve its target,” he said.

“Previous Congress regimes created public assets. But the present BJP government is selling away those assets to private parties,” he said adding that after putting up government-owned enterprise Air India for sale, the Central Govt has now given nod to sell stake in Life Insurance Corporation (LIC). Further, he said that the government was also trying to privatise public health. He said the proposed scheme to have a medical college attached to a district hospital in Public-Private-Partnership mode clearly means that people would have to pay for medical services in those hospitals.

“Earlier, budget speeches used to be a serious document with full of data and statistics with complete clarity on estimated revenues and expenditure. However, this time, it appears that the budget speech was not prepared by economists, but political speech writers. The focus was more on using ‘decorative and deceptive terms’ and phrases praising Prime Minister Narender Modi.

Uttam Kumar Reddy said that the budget was highly disappointing for Telangana State. “The Finance Minister gave no clarity on devolution of taxes to States and when their pending dues would be cleared. Telangana has been facing injustice since 2014-15 and not a single promised made in the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act has been honoured. While TRS Government failed to make effective representation, the BJP Govt at the Centre neglected Telangana to the extent as if did doesn’t exists in India’s map,” he said.

The TPCC chief said people of Telangana have fought a long battle of nearly six decades to achieve statehood due to the injustices done to the region. Despite creation of Telangana State, he said those injustices were still continuing. He said that the Congress MPs would raise the issue in the Parliament seeking justice and due share for Telangana State.