‘No income, how can they benefit from tax relief’: Who said what on Budget 2023
Budget 2023: The main highlight of the budget was the five major announcements related to personal income tax, including a change in tax slab under the new tax regime.
Political reactions started to pour in soon after Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented the Union budget for the fiscal year 2023-24. While BJP leaders hailed the budget as a ‘middle-class bonanza’ and inclusive, opposition leaders said the government is not addressing the serious economic conditions in the country including the common man's plight.
Who said what:
Prime Minister Narendra Modi said the first budget of Amrit Kaal will build a strong foundation for building a developed India.
“This budget will fulfil dreams of aspirational society including poor people, middle-class people, farmers,” he said in an address to the nation.
West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee said the budget will deprive the poor. Addressing a government function at Bolpur in Birbhum district, she claimed that the changes in the income tax slabs will not help anyone.
"This Union Budget is not futuristic, totally opportunistic, anti-people and anti-poor. It will benefit only one class of people. This Budget will not help address the country's unemployment issue. It has been prepared with an eye on the 2024 Lok Sabha elections," she said.
"The changes in the income tax slabs will not help anyone. There is no ray of hope in this Budget -- it is a dark dark budget. Give me half an hour and I will show you how to prepare a Budget for the poor," she added.
BJP president JP Nadda said the first budget of Amrit Kaal shows the visionary and far-sighted leadership of PM Modi.
"This budget shows our stable economy, power of young India and multicultural work ethics. This budget highlights core vision of PM Modi as it brings schemes for people at bottom of pyramid," he said.
Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Priyanka Chaturvedi said that Maharashtra received nothing in the Budget 2023 while the two neighbouring states, Gujarat and Karnataka, received major support. Chaturvedi said that Surat, a flourishing market for lab-made diamonds, got support in the budget.
“GIFT city is a city crushing under the weight of gifts received from centre yet not living up to the hype,” she said.
Sitharaman also announced a grant of ₹5,300 crore for the Upper Bhadra Project in Karnataka.
Congress General Secretary KC Venugopal criticised the budget saying the government is not addressing the actual problem of price rise and unemployment.
"There is no income for the people. How can they benefit by increasing the tax limit?" he said,
Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Shatrughan Sinha said the Budget had a major focus on "Hum Do Humare Do" and had nothing special for the people belonging to the middle-class strata.
"The budget was presented keeping in mind the upcoming Lok Sabha elections and there was nothing special mention for the middle-class people. Looking at the budget, it seems as if it has been created to specially care about the 'Hum Do Humare Do' as it is evident from the significantly reduced highest slab for Income Tax payers. People understand it well whom have they done it for," Shatrughan Sinha said.
Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati said it would be better if the budget is for the country rather than for the party.
"For them, there is just talk. It is better if the budget is more for the country than for the party," she added, indirectly suggesting that the party hoped to gain electoral benefits from the exercise.
"Like earlier in the country, in the last nine years also the budgets of the central government kept on coming in which announcements, promises, claims and hopes were showered. They all became redundant when India's middle class faced the problems of inflation, poverty and unemployment etc and were reduced to lower middle class," Mayawati said in a tweet in Hindi.
Congress MP Gaurav Gogoi said the budget provided no solution to price-rise, inflation, and unemployment.
“Poor got just words and rhetoric. Budget benefits only the big industrialists. Tax rebate up to ₹7 Lakhs is insignificant considering the inflation and price-rise, it’s like drop in ocean for middle class,” Gogoi said.
