Budget Not Inspired by Polls: Indian Govt

By JAWED NAQVI

NEW DELHI: India's bold federal budget, which took the country's economic reforms forward in a big leap, was not framed with an eye on a likely mid-term national election, Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda said February 27.

"It is not a question of winning elections," Deve Gowda, who heads a shaky coalition government, told Reuters. "My sincere desire is to lift the poor out of their miserable state and to make India a major player in the world economy."

Businesspersons and stock markets, who had been awaiting the budget for fiscal 1997/98 starting April 1 with trepidation, cheered the budget, which slashed taxes and set steps to encourage investment while widening the tax net.

"This budget is not for political gain. It is a sincere effort to make the country economically strong," Deve Gowda said shortly after Finance Minister P Chidambaram unveiled what he said was a budget for "broad-based growth with social justice."

Asked if his budget provisions for the socially weaker classes were designed to win possible snap polls, Chidambaram told reporters: "Elections, my friend, are four years away."

Deve Gowda's United Front government appeared to have won at least partial favor with the Congress party, his make-or-break ally in parliament with the bold proposals in the budget.

"This is a pragmatic budget. It does not seem to be an election-year budget," former lower house speaker Shivraj Patil of the Congress party told Reuters.

Former finance minister Manmohan Singh said in an interview published February 27 that Deve Gowda's economic policy appeared to suggest the government was worried about an election.

Some senior leaders of the 15-party ruling United Front, however, were not entirely happy with Chidambaram's proposals.

"There is not much to encourage agriculture in this budget," said Agriculture Minister Chaturanan Mishra, a member of the Communist Party of India (CPI).

The CPI is one of the key players in the 15-party coalition government. Both Chidambaram and Deve Gowda denied that farmers had been ignored.

"Subsidies have been considerably expanded...I responded to the farmer's concern and increased the subsidies," Chidambaram said on state-run Doordarshan television.

Deve Gowda controls fewer than 200 deputies in the 545-member Lok Sabha, the lower house of parliament. The Congress, with some 140 lawmakers, has frequently threatened to review its nine-month-old support for the government, triggering fears of early elections.

But the United Front got considerable relief this week when the main opposition right-wing Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) backed down from its proposal to support a no-confidence motion against Deve Gowda.

BJP leader and former prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee said at that time he expected the government to fall "under its own contradictions."

Chidambaram suggested the communist-led leftist groups within the ruling alliance were consulted closely on the budget.

"The decision for an amnesty for drawing out black money was proposed by Jyoti Basu," Chidambaram said of the communist chief minister of the state of West Bengal.

"I do not believe there is going to be any misunderstanding among the United Front partners," he said.

The BJP, tipped to gain from any early polls, was expected to continue its attacks on the government.

"There is nothing about poverty or village or joblessness that this government has been talking of so much in the budget," BJP deputy Pramod Mahajan said. (Reuter)

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