Union Budget 2025: Setting a road map to transform India's economy

The Budget 2025-26 is part of the journey which commenced in 2014. It is a lockstep march to 2047; celebrating 100 years of independence and Viksit Bharat. The Budget is a roadmap to transform India’s economy by combining growth-enhancing investments with reforms across agriculture, micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), infrastructure, and exports, through prudent fiscal management and regulatory modernisation. The introduction of Goods and Services Tax (GST), digitisation, and financial inclusion, have shaped the economy since the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) came to power in 2014.

 

Agriculture, MSMEs, investment, and export are the four engines of development outlined by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. Agriculture receives significant focus. The plan aims to transform 100 low-productivity districts by converging existing schemes with targeted interventions to boost productivity in pulses, fruits and vegetables, millet, among others through high-yielding seeds, encourage crop diversification, improve post-harvest storage, and enhance irrigation facilities.

 

The finance minister announced a series of initiatives for boosting tourism, including plans to ease travel for foreign tourists, develop prominent tourist sites, and promote medical tourism in collaboration with private players.

 

Ten million plus registered MSMEs contribute significantly to manufacturing and employment. The Budget enhances their classification criteria by increasing investment and turnover thresholds. Sector-specific schemes, including those for footwear, leather, toys, and food processing, aim to boost competitiveness, employment, and exports.

 

The people, economy, and innovation underpin the investment strategy of the government. The plan is to invest in human capital by scaling up schemes like Saksham Anganwadi and Poshan 2.0, setting up 50,000 Atal Tinkering Labs to nurture innovation, and enhancing digital connectivity in rural schools and health centres.

 

Allowing 100 per cent FDI in the insurance sector is heartening. It would help augment a social security safety net for citizens as the sector deepens penetration. That cancer-treating life-saving medicines saw a significant reduction of duties was a sensitive touch by the finance minister.

 

The central theme is export promotions, with the creation of an Export Promotion Mission to coordinate export credit and support MSMEs, and the launch of 'BharatTradeNet', a unified digital platform for trade documentation and financing. Measures to integrate domestic manufacturing with global supply chains and foster global capability centres (GCCs) in emerging Tier-II cities are also highlighted.

 

The writer is Chairman, Hinduja Group of Companies (India)