Budget lacked vision, says EAC-PM member Ashima Goyal

MUMBAI: The Union Budget was “disappointing” as it lacked a vision, though measures like relaxing the fiscal deficit target and simplifying income tax are positives, the PM’s economic advisory council member Ashima Goyal said.
Goyal, who is a part-time member of the Economic Advisory Council to the PM (EAC-PM), also said it was a “surprise” not to have a mention of the word “slowdown” in the nearly three-hour long speech by finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
The Budget document is a “balancing act” between fiscal stimulus to drive growth and the need to be responsible on spending, she said at the Indira Gandhi Institute for Development Research here “Overall, it (Budget) was disappointing because they didn’t bring out the vision as a first real Budget of a new government. It had to give a vision,” the economist said. India’s GDP growth is expected to slip to a decadal low of 5% this fiscal, pressured by domestic factors like drop in consumption, as well as global issues.
However, the finance minister has achieved a “balancing act” through her moves, Goyal said.
She elaborated that by adopting the ‘exit clause’ under the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management (FRBM) Act, the government gave a stimulus to growth and yet affirmed commitment to rules against fiscal profligacy. To drive the point further, she said a 0.5-percentage point relaxation in fiscal deficit target offered under the exit clause makes lot of resources available, considering that the overall size of the economy is nearly $3 trillion.