Congress MP Shashi Tharoor, terming the Union Budget 2025 as "underwhelming", said that it only targeted the voters of Delhi and Bihar. "If you're a Delhi voter or a Bihar voter and you're earning a fixed middle class salary, you may have reasons to cheer. But if you're not, then I'm afraid there's nothing in the budget for you," said Mr Tharoor in an exclusive conversation with NDTV.
"If you're unemployed, like a very large percentage of our middle class, young people who are looking for jobs, the record amount of college-educated in our country who can't find jobs, there's nothing there for you because there's no encouragement whatsoever for jobs to come forth," he added.
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced massive income tax cuts today, aiming to boost consumption. She said that individuals earning an annual income of up to Rs 12 would now be effectively exempt from paying income tax. "The new structure will substantially reduce the taxes of the middle class and leave more money in their hands, boosting household consumption, savings and investment," Nirmala Sitharaman told parliament while unveiling the budget.
'There Might Be Fine Print'
Slamming the BJP-led Centre, Shashi Tharoor said the government was "better at announcements than at delivery".
"Yes, you've got some income tax relief, but on the whole, everything they've tended to announce hasn't been matched in implementation," Mr Tharoor said.
"So, these big headlines, we'll have to see how they actually work out in practice. On the tax break, we still have to wait before we completely applaud for the income tax bill proposed for next week that she said she's going to bring out because there might be fine print... which might change all the calculations as to who benefits from what out of the tax relief that has been promised to us," he said.
The government will introduce a new Income Tax bill in Parliament next week, replacing the six-decade-old Income Tax Act of 1961.
"The new bill will be clear and direct in text with close to half of the present law, in terms of both chapters and words. It will be simple to understand for taxpayers and tax administration, leading to tax certainty and reduced litigation," Ms Sitharaman said.
Shashi Tharoor also said that even though the budget provided relief to the middle class in some form today, the segment is still hurting "because their real incomes haven't gone up".
"Even those who are salaried, and who will get some relief from this particular budget, their real incomes have actually been going down. Because your nominal income may be at a certain level, what you can buy for it is affected by inflation. And we haven't heard the Finance Minister saying very much about inflation. Then, there is the problem of unemployment, which I've addressed. But, there's also the serious concern we have about investment," he said.
Mr Tharoor also doubted that the new measures will indeed boost consumption: "As much as those people from the salaried middle classes will get more money in their pockets, they might be able to spend it, or they might feel the need to save it, or they might have to pay off loans. (We'll have to see where that money goes. And as I said, that's still subject to the fine print in next week's tax announcement".
'Not A Generous Budget For Kerala'
The Thiruvananthapuram MP also alleged that it "has not been a generous budget" for Kerala which was hit by a devastating landslide last year.
"Kerala certainly hasn't got very much at all. And we had this horrible landslide, in Wayanad, and we had requested some sort of assistance for the victims and nothing has come from the centre. They want the state to spend its own disaster relief funds," said Mr Tharoor.
"So, this has not been a generous budget for our state and I don't know about every other state. We'll have to go through it in detail. But we're just not getting the support that Bihar can celebrate today," he added.
The Budget includes seven significant announcements aimed at promoting development in poll-bound Bihar. The announcements were the formation of a Makhan Board to support and promote the cultivation and marketing of makhana (fox nuts), a significant crop in Bihar; expansion of IIT Patna; establishment of the National Food Technology Institute in Bihar; a separate budget for the development of the Western Kosi Canal; plans to upgrade the Bihta Airport; expansion of Patna Airport; and improve infrastructure and the construction of three new greenfield airports in Bihar.
The announcement has drawn the ire of the opposition which criticised the Centre for offering a "bonanza" to Bihar, ruled by National Democratic Alliance (NDA) partner Nitish Kumar, and "cruelly" ignoring Andhra Pradesh, another pillar of the alliance.
'Where Are Jobs?'
Shashi Tharoor, further criticising Ms Sitharaman's budget speech, said it didn't address the "bigger concern" about how the government was going to generate jobs.
"Where are you going to generate jobs? And where's the economy going to grow? Isn't that a much bigger concern we have than perhaps a few people in Delhi and Bihar going happily to the polls for the BJP?" he said.
He also asserted that without inflation control, the tax reliefs wouldn't do much. "Without inflation control, what your nominal salary is or is able to buy is not the same that it was able to buy one year ago, let alone five years ago. So I do think that we have still a section of our public that is seeking to be appealed to through this budget who are still hurting. And above all, the unemployed are very, very much hurting. And they're looking for some assurances of jobs, (11:37) and they haven't got it in this budget.
Speaking about US President Donald Trump's threats about tariffs, he said, "If tariffs are imposed on us, it'll hurt exports, which are already hurting. So that's something we've got to be really conscious of".
Recently, Trump re-upped threats of 100 percent tariffs on BRICS nations - a bloc including Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa - if they create a rival to the US dollar.
from NDTV News- Topstories https://ift.tt/YJvu1AP
