Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee President Harshvardhan Sapkal has hit out at the budget presented by Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, stating it was full of large figures and hollow announcements.
“The government has piled up a mountain of debt on the state, and with a deficit of ₹40,000 crore, this budget will push Maharashtra towards bankruptcy. The budget is dominated by projects such as the bullet train, metro, and underground tunnels,” Sapkal said, adding that the the poor in villages, tribals, labourers, women, the unemployed, and youth had no place in the budget.
“Overall, this budget appears to be meant only for a few cities and a select few people. The common citizens will gain nothing from it,” he added.
Sapkal said that the vision of ‘Viksit Maharashtra 2047’ and a $1 trillion economy is nothing but a daydream. “In the past few years, the BJP alliance government announces the budget and then presents supplementary demands worth crores of rupees in every subsequent legislative session. The Economic Survey report itself shows that the state is heading towards bankruptcy. The total burden of the state’s debt and guarantees is close to ₹12 lakh crore, and around ₹65,000 crore has to be paid as loan repayments. Therefore, there is a massive gap between the figures announced in the budget and the actual situation on the ground. In the previous budget, ₹22,658 crore was allocated for Scheduled Caste schemes, but in reality only ₹6,200 crore was spent. Big figures are announced in the budget for schemes meant for backward classes, minorities, and tribals, but the actual spending rarely happens.”
Sapkal further said that while unemployment is the biggest crisis before the state, the budget has announced the recruitment of only 75,000 jobs. Looking at the BJP government’s track record of previous mega recruitment drives, this too appears to be another deceptive announcement. Although it has been said that the ‘Ladki Bahin’ scheme will not be discontinued, the promise of ₹2,100 crore still remains unfulfilled. The government has once again deceived the beloved sisters. Even though a loan waiver has been announced, lakhs of farmers are still deprived of the benefits of the loan waiver scheme earlier announced by the Fadnavis government. Considering this, the new loan waiver announcement should not turn out to be mere lip service to farmers. The government’s behaviour is such that its assurances cannot be believed until they are actually implemented.
Some announcements have been made for farmers and the agriculture sector, but due to the trade agreement with the United States, it will be difficult for farmers to get fair prices for their produce. There is a greater fear that farmers’ income may decrease rather than increase. The announcements in the budget are also insufficient to stop farmer suicides. Despite good rainfall last year, the state’s irrigated area has reduced from 56 lakh hectares to 39 lakh hectares. There has also been a decline in cultivable land. This clearly shows that the government has left farmers to fend for themselves.
Projects such as Third Mumbai, Fourth Mumbai, the Shaktipeeth Highway, and the Vadhvan Port are meant to benefit Adani and Ambani and will not benefit ordinary citizens. The government’s solar energy policy is also misleading; instead of providing relief to electricity consumers, it will impose an additional burden of 26 paise per unit. Due to smart meters, electricity bills have already increased sharply. The government has claimed that investment agreements worth ₹50 lakh crore were signed at Davos between 2022 and 2025, but according to the Economic Survey report, only about ₹6 lakh crore of investment has actually come into the state, Sapkal said.