Nirmala Sitharaman to present Budget after 48 years as second woman finance minister. Know who was the first
New Delhi: The Modi 2.0 government is all set to present the Union Budget for FY20. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present the Union Budget in the parliament on July 5 becoming the second female finance minister to do so. Former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi is the first and only women till now to present the Union Budget.
Indira Gandhi presented the Union Budget of India in 1970-71 she took over the Finance portfolio because Morarji Desai resigned as the Minister of Finance. She presented the budget in 1970 and held the portfolio for a year before appointing her home minister, Yashwantrao Chavan as FM. Morarji Desai has presented the budget ten times which is the most by any FM.
It is worth mentioning that Nirmala Sitharaman was also the second female defence minister after Indira Gandhi who held the portfolio till 1982. However, the stark difference is that even though Indira Gandhi held the defence ministry portfolio (November 1975-December 1975, January 1980-January 1982), she was not the first full-time women defence minister as she carried the defence ministry portfolio along with the ‘Prime Minister‘ position.
The first session of the newly-elected 17th Lok Sabha will be held from June 17 to July 26 and the Economic Survey for 2019-20 will be tabled on July 4.Sitharaman who is all set to present her maiden Budget in the Lok Sabha, would be holding intensive consultations with trade and industry bodies, besides other stakeholders this week. Industry chambers like CII and Ficci have already made detailed presentations on their suggestions for the Budget 2019.
The 59-year-old Sitharaman will have to address slowing economy, financial sector troubles like rising NPAs and liquidity crisis in NBFCs, job creation, private investments, exports revival, agrarian crisis and raise public investment without compromising on fiscal prudence.
As the government gets down to prepare the Budget, North Block, which houses the finance ministry, will be in ‘quarantine’ or out of bounds for visitors and media from Monday. Sitharaman’s budget team comprises Minister of State for Finance Anurag Singh Thakur and Chief Economic Advisor Krishnamurthy Subramanian.
