Political parties give mixed reactions to Interim Budget

New Delhi, Feb 16 (ANI): The political parties on Monday gave mixed reactions to the Interim Budget 2009-10, as proposed by acting Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee.

Union Minister of Science and Technology Kapil Sibal said, "The economy will kick-start with the whatever expenditure it has and once this money reaches the people they will spend it and once they spend it money will start flowing in the market and with that the economy will improve and that is the idea of this interim budget."

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), however, blamed the Central Government for 'doling out lollypops' and said the budget was silent on the concerns of common man, which was the poll plank of the Congress party.

Senior BJP leader Sushma Swaraj said, "Today common man is facing inflation, unemployment and farmer-suicide, but none of these issues came up in the budget speech. This government is going to seek a fresh mandate and when the common man would ask the government as to what they have done for them and their answer would be in negative then their dream of coming to power again will be shattered."

Communist parties, who were allies of the ruling coalition before withdrawing support last year, also criticized the budget.

Communist Party leader Gurudas Dasgupta said, "Our strongest criticism is that the greatest problem of the country has not been referred to in the budget at all. Not a single sentence has been said about the job loss and the retrenchment. Two million people have lost their jobs in last three months. Finance ministry of this country and a prominent politician representing the Congress party does not recognize the first human problem, that is, job loss."

Communist party of India (Marxist) said the Congress party presented its election manifesto, which is far away from the reality.

Senior CPI (M) leader Bindra Karat said, "The Congress party wants to feed the rats in the country? People's kitchens are empty because they have cut 73 percent allocation for APL (off take of subsidized grains people above property line) for the states. So what are these claims? It is an election manifesto and that also very far removed from the actual reality."

Former Governor of Reserve Bank of India (RBI) C. Rangarajan said some more relief could have been given in the budget.

"They are going to be able to maintain employment level only by enhancing the growth but there are specific sectors where I said some relief could have been made," Rangarajan said. (ANI)