Nirmala Seetharaman’s Budget 2021 in a Nutshell for You

As we speak, Nirmala Seetharaman, our esteemed finance minister is presenting the #Budget2021 to a live audience. If you feel left out every year at this juncture when the national budget is announced, we thought we’d alleviate your dilemma. We quickly assimilated the key points of this year’s budget to give you enough fodder for the hottest debates that are no doubt already ensuing.

SaltSnap summarises the 2021 budget:

This year, the focus has mostly been on healthcare since Covid-19 taught us how important healthcare is to every individual of this country.

This year’s budget will support about 17,000 and 7,000 urban health & wellness centres. Public hospitals suffer from overcrowding and patients must deal with high cost of care. To resolve this crisis, critical care blocks are to be established in public care hospitals.

Here is everything you need to know about the Union Budget 2021:

1. Nirmala Seetharaman said that for the year 2020-21, the fiscal deficit is now 9.5% of the GDP. For the upcoming year2022, fiscal deficit is estimated at 6.8%.
2. In her speech, Nirmala Seetharaman announced that the Prime Minister’s Atma Nirbhar Swasth Bharath Yojana will be launched with an outlay of 64,000 crores dedicated towards health infrastructure.
3. The Covid vaccine takes the spotlight in this year’s budget with 35,000 crores allocated for the same.

Key Highlights of the Budget 2021:

• Our beloved Finance Minister proposed a steep climb in capital expenditure of 5.54 lakh crore for 2022.
• This year, the budget was presented by our Finance Minister through a Tablet instead of the traditional Bahi-Khata.
• The market opened in the green with Sensex rising to 443 points, up to 46728.83 right before the budget was presented. Nifty was up by 148.85 to 13749.45.
• The economic survey projected a GDP growth of 11%.
• Railways received a capital expenditure of 1,10,000 Crore.
• The finance ministry has declared a whopping 3.5 Trillion electricity distribution reform program.
• There has also been an announcement for 7 textile parks under a Mega Textile Park scheme which will progress over the course of 3 years. 

How Road Construction will benefit this year:

• March 2022 will see up to 8500 kilometres of road highway projects already awarded.
• The Bharath Mala Project valued at 5.35 Lakh Crore has already awarded over 13,000 kilometres of road projects, valued at 3.3 Lakh Crore. 3800 kilometres of roads in this project have already been constructed.
•  About 100 tourist destinations and close to 45 towns will be connected by highways.
• West Bengal received 25,000 crores for Road Development.

The 6 pillars of the budget proposal 2021:

1. Health & Well-being
2. Physical, financial capital, & infrastructure.
3. Inclusive development for aspirational India.
4. Innovation, R&D.
5. Re-invigorating human capital.
6. Minimum government, maximum governance.

Budget 2021 is senior-citizen friendly:

Senior citizens have contributed a great deal to this country in their prime. Earlier, the tax slab exemption for the elderly was 80 years and above. But this year, senior citizens above 75 years of age with pension are exempted from filing taxes.

Investors are keenly watching the union budget, so is the entire world. The nation is hopeful that the Budget 2021 will be the country’s saving grace for recovering from the aftershocks of the pandemic. Only time will tell.