PM Modi to chair all-party & NDA meeting on Jan 30 ahead of Budget session of Parliament

With the Budget Session of the Parliament inching closer, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is all set to chair an all-party meeting on January 30. An NDA (National Democratic Alliance) is also scheduled to be held on January 30. The meeting will be held via video-conferencing. The Union Budget 2021-22 will be presented by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on February 1. 

Meanwhile, Nirmala Sitharaman held the pre-budget meeting with Finance Ministers of all States and Union Territories on Monday morning via video conferencing. Along with Sitharaman, Finance Secretary AB Pandey, Expenditure Secretary TV Somanathan, DEA Tarun Bajaj and Chief Economic Advisor KV Subramaniam were present in the meeting. Previously, the Finance Minister had chaired the pre-budget consultation meetings which witnessed the participation of 170 invitees representing nine stakeholder groups. Nearly 15 meetings were held between December 14 to December 23 with stakeholder groups which belonged to Financial and Capital Markets; Health, Education and Rural Development; Water and Sanitation; Trade Union and Labour Organization; Industry, Services and Trade; Infrastructure, Energy and Climate Change sector; Agriculture and Agro-Processing Industry; Industrialists; and Economists.

The Union Budget for the fiscal year 2021-22 assumes greater significance as the Centre aims to at a faster turnaround in the economy after the steep decline owing to the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent lockdown. India, which had in 2019 overtaken the UK to become the fifth-largest economy in the world, was knocked off course, due to the lockdown. The rate of GDP growth sank to a more than 10-year low of 4.2 per cent in 2019, down from 6.1 per cent the previous year.

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2021 budget to be paperless 

The Finance Ministry has decided to do away with the age-old tradition of printing the budget copies this year in view of the Coronavirus pandemic. This is the first time since independence, that the budget will be paperless. However, giving the entire process a digital push, the government has decided to provide soft copies of the budget to the lawmakers. Also, sources from ANI state that the traditional Halwa ceremony will be hosted 10 days prior to the presentation of Budget in the Parliament. In the Budget session, this time, question hour and zero hour will make a comeback after it was scrapped due to COVID 19 precaution. 

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