Union budget does not provide any relief: CM Pinarayi Vijayan

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Expressing disappointment over the Union Budget, the LDF government in Kerala on Tuesday alleged it lacked vision or preparation to face the challenges posed by COVID-19 and instead of empowering the states financially, the budget was weakening them in the backdrop of the pandemic.

In a hard-hitting statement, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan alleged that the budget, presented by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, would lead to rising inflation, widening of gap between the haves and have-nots, squeezing up of states financially, appeasing the interests of big corporates and hurting the interests of the country and its people in general.

The basic perception that the economic crisis created by COVID can be resolved only by financially empowering the states could be seen nowhere in the budget, he said.

''It is a matter of concern that the allocation for the areas like agriculture, food subsidy, rural employment and COVID management have been decreased compared to the last year's budget,'' Vijayan said, adding that it does not seem to have considered the demands of the states including the extension of the GST compensation for another five years.

The union budget also gave enough hints that the globalisation policies, that have caused misery to common people, would be further strengthened and taken forward, he said.

The Chief Minister, however, said it was gratifying to see Kerala's unique projects like digital university, online education, M-service and optical fiber expansion as models in the budget by the union government. Expressing the same sentiments, state Finance Minister K N Balagopal said he was sad to say that the budget has no significant announcements to tide over the challenges posed by the pandemic and to strengthen the public sector as expected widely.

Over 20 crore people became jobless due to the pandemic but the budget has nothing to address the concerns of jobless people or to strengthen the employment sector, he alleged.

Stating that the budget failed to make increased allocations in significant sectors, Balagopal pointed out that only Rs 5000 crore was set aside for the COVID vaccines this time in the place of Rs 39,000 crore allocated in the previous budget.

It was objectionable that the budget did not have any reference about the states' long pending demand for the extension of GST compensation for five more years, he further said.

Like the Left government, the opposition Congress in the state also termed the union budget as disappointing and alleged that the Finance Minister ''wasted one more opportunity to revive the ailing Indian economy.'' ''Adding ''PM'' as prefix and ''Shakti'' as suffix to every scheme doesn't help in demand generation. The focus is only tokenism and renaming schemes after the Prime Minister,'' KPCC chief and Kannur MP, K Sudhakaran tweeted.

Leader of opposition in the state Assembly V D Satheesan alleged that the budget overlooked the COVID crisis and proposed to make life more miserable for commoners. Though financial intervention was expected from the side of the central government, Sitharaman made a false claim in the budget that the country's economy was sound, he claimed.

Even in the time of crisis, the Centre was implementing tax terrorism in the country and generating revenue by selling off public sector enterprises, Satheesan said alleging that the GDP growth had been driven through misguided means like demonetisation and unscientific implementation of the GST.

The LoP also urged the state government to backtrack from its multi-crore Silver Line rail corridor project in view of the budget announcement of the launching of 400 Vande Bharat train services in three years.

Kerala Vyapari Vyavasayi Ekopana Samithi, an umbrella organisation of traders, also came out against the union budget saying it was not beneficial for small-scale traders.