Editorial 1st Quarter 2020

   EDITORIAL            FIRE           MAGAZINE            FEBRUARY         2020

                                                CHIEF   EDITOR

                                          

                             

                                     THOTA HANUMAIAH

 

                              UNION    BUDGET    2020

                            

 A glance at the Union Budget reveals the deepening crisis of economic distress and in spite of that the Central government is only interested in providing relief t          o the corporate sector and the Wealthy instead of tackling the ever increasing unemployment and depleting livelihood situations of the working people of all sectors, which is a root cause of economic slowdown. The government instead of devising policies and programmes for increased spending to address the falling demand and resource mobilization to address the crisis of revenues, resorted to reducing the fiscal deficit by further slashing the government expenditure and selling off the assets of the nation to big corporates, the burden of which will, ultimately, be carried by the working class.

In the tax proposals, the FM announced further tax concessions to the corporate sector and the rich. This comes when India’s richest 1 per cent hold more than four times the wealth held by the bottom 70 per cent, nearly 100 crore people. The earlier concessions given in corporate taxes have already resulted in a shortfall of Rs. 1.55 lakh crores in Revised Estimates as compared to Budget Estimates for 2019-20. A growth of 12 per cent over the inflated tax revenues of 2019-20 has been projected for 2020-21. Clearly, this means raising resources from privatization and disinvestment – an increase from Rs. 65,000 crores (RE 2019-20) to Rs. 2 lakh ten thousand crores in 2020-21. This will be more than neutralize the increase in actual capital expenditure of Rs. 62,000 crores. Such is the desperation that government decided to sell its shares even in the iconic LIC, the biggest financer of government schemes.

The policies and priorities pursued by the government has led to a massive dip in the government’s revenue resulted in a slump in the Indian economy. The gross tax revenue fell by 2.98 lakh crore in a single year .Revenue from customs; excise and the GST collection fell to a staggering dip. In an attempt to hide these tax revenue declines and to balance its books the government took an even more unprecedented step, in that, it refused to pay the states their share of revenues as statutorily required. This cut amounted to 1.53 lakh crores. This means that the states are now bearing the burden of the centre’s policies, including the corporate freebies. As a result the states are grappling for funds to fulfill their responsibilities.                                            

The expenditure Budget for last year presented in this budget shows how the government passed the whole mess on to the people, that too, when the people across the country were already reeling under massive unemployment, price rise, loss of existing jobs, and cuts in income as a result of slow down. In such a dire crisis, not only were they expecting a strong move from the government to provide some relief, but increasing government spending would have also been a good way of tackling the crisis. As more money spent by the government could have pumped up the purchasing power in the hands of people, which would in turn increased demand for goods and services, pushing up the economy. But, the government adopted the very opposite policy. Over the year, it reduced spending on central sector schemes by over Rs.97.6 thousand crore, while funds for centrally sponsored schemes like MGNREGA, PMGSY, etc) were cut by Rs. 14.79 thousand crores, In addition, various other central expenditures were cut by Rs.30.58 thousand crore. The impact of this was that diverse schemes and programmes suffered adding to the misery and distress of people.

It shows that the government does not care for the people but, willing to sacrifice their interests for the benefit of corporate (both domestic and foreign) sections. It can be seen from the following cuts made; in food subsidy, which ensure that the food grain reaches people at affordable prices, was cut by over Rs.75.53 thousand crores. Spending on health went down by Rs.1169 crores. Even spending 0n agriculture and allied sectors like fisheries, suffered a squeeze of Rs.30.68 thousand crores. These cuts would affect large number of people.                                                                                                                                                                                                        

The wide range of anti-people policies contained in this year’s budget will further squeeze the livelihood conditions of the vast majority of our people. The government has destroyed the Indian economy, imposing unprecedented burdens on the people. At the same time, it has been giving concession after concession to the rich and the corporates, which has widened economic inequalities amongst our people to levels never seen ever before in independent India.

                                           Thota .Hanumaiah