Union Budget is an annual financial statement of estimated receipts and expenditures of Government of India. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present the full-year Budget for 2019-20 on July 5. It will be the first budget of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi government in its second term. The interim budget for the year 2019-20 was presented by then Finance Minister Piyush Goyal on February 1. Budget is prepared by the budget division in the Ministry of Finance after consulting with other ministries.
Here are 5 things to know about Budget preparation:
1. The Budget is prepared through a calculative process between the Finance Ministry and the spending ministries. The finance minister and ministry officials meet representatives from the private sector, non-governmental organisations and other stakeholders to understand their expectations from the Budget. The Finance Ministry comes up with an estimate of how much money is available to spend on plan schemes.
2. The budget division issues an annual budget circular which consists of comprehensive instructions to all government ministries or departments for calculation of budget estimates.
3. The ministries also provide their estimates to the finance ministry on how much money they expect to earn next year.
4. The ceremony for the announcement of the Union Budget starts with a traditional "Halwa" ceremony, which marks the beginning of the printing process of the Budget. The finance minister and other officials participate in this 'halwa ceremony'. After the dish is served, a large number of officials and support staff, who are directly associated with the Budget-making and -printing process, are required to stay in the ministry and remain cut off from their families till the presentation of the Budget by the finance minister in Parliament.
5. The President's recommendation is required to be obtained for introduction and consideration of Budget in Lok Sabha. The budget is presented in Lok Sabha after President's recommendation.
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