Increase the non-agriculture income to improve the condition of farmers – Shubhashis Gangopadhyay
Pune, February 3, 2018: The budget presented by Arun Jaitley, Union Finance Minister (FM) emphasised on agriculture and healthcare. “The FM said that 86% farmer households in the country have been identified as small farmers. According to available information, more than 60% farmer household earn less than 40% of their income from agriculture. The balance comes from non-agriculture activites of the farmer household. So, to uplift the condition of the farmers government must make suitable reforms and instead should focus to increase the non-agriculture income,” opnined Dr. Shubhashis Gangopadhyay, Director, India Development Foundation at a Panel Discussion on ‘Union Budget 2018 – 2019’ organised by Pune International Centre (PIC) at Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics on Saturday.
While Ajit Ranade, noted economist moderated the discussion with other economic analysts like Dr.K.L. Dhingra, Director, National Institute of Bank Management, Dr.K.S. Hari, Professor, Public Finance, Gokhale Institute of Politics and Finance, Dr. Rathin Roy, Director, National Institute of Public Finance and Policy, Dr. Shubhashis Gangopadhyay, Director, India Development Foundation who were called to interpret the Budget. Also, Vijay Kelkar, Vice President, PIC and Prashant Girbane, Honorary Director, PIC were present on the occasion.
Roy called the Budget as structural and not populist. “Last year, the finance minister had said that the fiscal deficit would be 3.2 percent of the GDP. But that did not happen and actually went 0.3 percent higher than the financial year which equals to around 6000 crores. This is something the Financial Minister cannot tackle without co-operation from other stakeholders – to increase non-tax revenue and control committed expenditure,” he exclaimed.
While describing the Budget Dhingra expressed, “Tough Government hasn’t considered the banking sector much but in totality, the budget will spur the growth and contribute towards GDP.”
Gangopadhyay also claimed that the Budget seemed liked an Election year budget, but the good budget is expected not to be done before elections but after coming to power, it is expected to be presented in its first year. “Healthcare provision in this budget for economically weaker class is Big Bang reform having more than ten times the cost of healthcare, and seeing this magnitude, this scheme can take time to implement. The idea of skill development in our country is to learn after-school or out-of-school children. But skill development must be included in the school curriculum,” he added.
