New Delhi. Where on one hand, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present the country’s general budget on February 1, 2022. Let us tell you that this will be her fourth budget as a full-time woman Finance Minister. In the meantime, let’s get a little acquainted with the interesting aspects related to the budget history. In this sequence, know today about the black budget of the country. Along with this, there was a budget in the history of the country, in which the then Prime Minister apologized during the budget speech. Let’s know some interesting things related to Indian budget history.
When Indira Gandhi apologized
Yes, on 28 February 1970, the former Prime Minister, being the Finance Minister with the Prime Minister’s post, presented the country’s general budget. By the way, people were well aware of Indira Gandhi’s mood, especially her strict tone. At the same time, when the mighty Indira Gandhi said in her budget speech, “Excuse me”, most members of the Lok Sabha were also surprised to hear this. Everyone started thinking that what is going to happen now, before which Indira Gandhi asked to apologize. But when Indira Gandhi spoke the next sentence, the doubts of everyone sitting there went away.
Took a tough decision to increase revenue
Actually, at that time Indira Gandhi had to increase the revenue, due to which she increased the duty on cigarettes from 3 to 22% in her budget. Before increasing the duty, however, she said, “I’m sorry, but this time I am going to put a burden on the pockets of cigarette smokers.” At the same time, after increasing the duty on cigarettes, Indira had said that this would increase the revenue of the government by an additional Rs 13.50 crore. Due to this, the cigarette smokers were like a jolt. So at the same time, he had also increased the exemption limit in income tax to 40 thousand rupees.
When ‘Black Budget’ was introduced in India
Significantly, in the financial year 1973-74, the budget presented by the then Finance Minister Yashwantrao B Chavan has been termed as the ‘black budget’ of Indian history. In fact, a deficit of more than Rs 550 crore was shown in that budget. Along with this, let us tell you another interesting fact that till the year 1955, the budget was presented only in English language. But then from the financial year 1955-56, the budget was printed for the first time in both English and Hindi language.