FRBM Act not breached in budget, committed to reducing fiscal deficit: FM

The Centre had earlier said it was committed to reduce the fiscal deficit to 3 per cent of GDP by 2020-21 and eliminate the primary deficit as per the FRBM Act.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Sunday said the 2020-21 union budget was prepared keeping the FRBM (Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management) in mind even as she maintained she would be remembered for presenting the "longest prepared budget" than for "longest speech" on it.

"So in a way all these (measures) and more has been done that the FRBM, as an Act, we have to keep in mind and also comply with it. So we have not really breached the FRBM. We have not gone outlandish on it.

We have kept fiscal discipline, which is a USP for both the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government and also for the Shri Narendra Modi Government," she said.

The Centre had earlier said it was committed to reduce the fiscal deficit -- the gap between total expenditure and revenue -- to 3 per cent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by 2020-21 and eliminate the primary deficit as per the FRBM Act.

The Minister was addressing a gathering of industry representatives and trade here.

Sitharaman said the budget was prepared between July last year and February this year, with inputs from all stakeholders, including various ministries. "It was probably for the first time, many people do tell me, for the first time, this was the longest speech.

I would rather be remembered in fact that it was the longest prepared budget between July and February," she said.