Deshbhakti is the defining feature of this budget, said Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal after Deputy CM and Finance Minister Manish Sisodia presented the seventh budget of the AAP government in its third term. “When this budget was presented it was told that this is a deshbhakti budget, so certainly deshbhakti is the defining feature. There will be many events that celebrate deshbhakti,” Arvind Kejriwal said. He also added that “this budget also lays the foundation for all that needs to be done to realise the dream for Delhites and the people of the country when it touches its 100th freedom anniversary.”
The budget also contains the outlines of all the programmes that the government will undertake to celebrate the 75th anniversary of Independence. “You asked about the central government, the central government belongs to the country, the government of Delhi belongs to the country, the government of MP belongs to the country, all governments will celebrate this together,” the Chief Minister replied when asked about the celebrations of the Modi-led NDA government.
“We will remember our martyrs, especially the lives, the message and the writings of Shaheede Azam Bhagat Singh and Baba Saheb Ambedkar will be taken to the people through multiple programmes via a special budget. The tricolor would be hoisted in various parts of Delhi,” he said.
Speaking of other steps that are being undertaken by the AAP government to mark the 75th anniversary of India’s Independence, Kejriwal noted that education will be turned into a Jan Andolan through programmes called youth for education, yoga and meditation.
The budget offers Covid-19 vaccines free in all government hospitals for Delhites , special mohalla clinics for women and a health card for all where all the data will be available on cloud. Delhi would also have the world’s first virtual school.
Bidding for the Olympics in 2048 and raising the per capita income of Delhites to match that of a citizen living in Singapore are the two other big promises in the 2021-22 Delhi budget.
Elaborating on this the Chief Minister said, “Delhi’s per capita income is very good when compared to other parts of the country but not so good when compared to other parts of the world. The Finance Minister has given a vision, our vision is that in 2047, Delhi’s per capita income should equal to Singapore’s per capita income.”
The Chief Minister conceded that to achieve this Delhi’s per capita income has to be raised by sixteen times, however, he assured that whatever needs to be done to achieve that will be done.
On bidding for the 2048 Olympic games, Kejriwal clarified that the government of Delhi will do it after talks with the central government.
Kejriwal expressed satisfaction that despite the challenges posed by Covid-19 pandemic when the income sources of the government dwindled and sources of expenditure spiralled, the government has been able to present a budget estimate worth Rs 69,000 crore compared to the Rs 65,000 crore presented last year, which is an increase of six percent.
Kejriwal also underlined the ‘extremely difficult ‘ circumstances under which the AAP 2020-21 budget has been presented. “The difficult circumstances made us open kitchens for multitudes of people, give ration to one crore people, prepare food for 10 lakh people every day, to enhance the income of taxi and auto drivers we gave Rs 5,000. So the sources of expenditure had spiralled while that of income had reduced,” the Delhi Chief Minister said.
The Chief Minister thanked the people of Delhi for having faith in the government, for paying their taxes in extremely trying circumstances, which not only ensured that the government ran, but that it ran well.
Kejriwal noted that all the subsidies that were given by the government continued despite financial crunch like the subsidies on electricity, free water, free and quality education in government schools, free medicines and medical facilities in government hospitals, free bus rides for women, etc. He also said that this year’s budget has also ensured that these subsidies continue.
The Chief Minister also underlined that the government has presented a surplus budget yet again. “Since our government has been formed, Delhi has had a surplus budget and the CAG report also acknowledges that Delhi is the only state where we do not have a loss-making budget, but a surplus budget. Today’s budget is also a surplus budget,” he said.
Stating that the ‘establishment cost’ which includes salaries, interest on subsidies is just 45% compared to 70% to 80% in other states, Kejriwal said that this means that 55% of the budget is being spent on schemes, programmes, development, social security. He said this shows an efficient financial management towards which Delhi is slowly moving.
The Chief Minister credited ‘efficient financial management’ for the increase in the budget estimate this year compared to the last year.
Kejriwal also expressed satisfaction that education and health continued to remain the top priority of the government as in the past.
“I am very happy that the trend of the past six to seven years has continued. Almost one fourth of the budget has been allocated for education while 14 percent of the budget is being spent on health, which have been the priorities of the government from the very beginning,” he said.
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