Letters: Budget - The big picture

This refers to the report "FM's crowd-pleasing balancing act" (March 1). The National Democratic Alliance government's first full Budget carries no big-bang economic reforms but the bold steps taken will boost the country's economy and growth. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has belied the allegation that the government was pro-corporate, anti-farmer, anti-poor and anti-aam aadmi, by announcing a number of measures and social security schemes for the agriculture sector, labourers and the common man.

Contrary to apprehensions, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme has been given the highest ever Budget allocation. The two biggest loopholes in the scheme that need to be plugged are corruption in its implementation and expenditure of thousands of crores without any asset creation. While the reaction of the Opposition parties was on expected lines, the media, economic experts and industry have largely welcomed it.

However, most honest taxpayers, the salaried middle class, are genuinely aggrieved by no hike in the exemption limit and the overall indirect impact of hike in service tax and customs duty rates. The standard deduction could have been revived at the least in their case.

M C Joshi Lucknow

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