We presented true figures\, did not make adjustments: Goyal

We presented true figures, did not make adjustments: Goyal

Press Trust of India  |  Mumbai 

Piyush said Friday the government wanted to give a true picture of the accounts in the Budget, and did not resort to any "adjustment" for misrepresenting the

The comments come in the backdrop of concerns raised from various quarters, including global rating agencies, about the government's move to up spending in a way that it slipped on the 3.3 per cent deficit target for FY19 and also went for a wider 3.4 per cent in FY20.

Speaking at a post-budget consultation with the industry, also said rounding-off of decimals is resulting in the slippage, pointing out that the deficit will come at 3.367 per cent, while the same for FY20 is 3.349 per cent that gets rounded off to 3.4 per cent.

Beyond the optics, said it was the government's commitment to transparency which resulted in the actual statement of accounts and recalled that had also advised the same in pre-budget discussions.

"If I wanted to, this required only an adjustment of Rs 5,017 crore in a budget of Rs 25 lakh crore for achieving the deficit target," he said.

Similarly, an adjustment of Rs 1,250 crore would have taken the FY20 deficit number to 3.3 per cent, he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

First Published: Fri, February 08 2019. 22:55 IST