Budget 2024: Did You Know It Was Not Always Presented At 11 Am? Here’S Why The Time Was Changed

7/20/2024 5:00:19 AM

(MENAFN- AsiaNet News) All eyes are on the Union Budget that will be presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday (July 23).
The National Democratic Alliance (NDA), led by the Bharatiya Janata Party, took office at the Centre for a third term in June, and this is their first budget.
India is witnessing two budgets this year – an interim one in February and a full one this month. This happened as the incumbent government cannot present a full Budget before the general elections.
For the third time in a row, Sitharaman will begin delivering the 2024 Union Budget in the Lok Sabha at 11 a.m. However, the morning hasn't always been the best time.
During the colonial era, the budget was delivered at 5pm. This procedure was followed in order to simultaneously make announcements in London and India. There is a 4-hour and 30-minute difference between Indian Standard Time (IST) and British Summer Time (BST). Thus, the budget was presented in India at 5 p.m., guaranteeing the British government that it would take place during the day at 12.30 p.m. in the UK.

This 5 pm time for the Budget speech was followed in India even after Independence. This finally changed in 1999 when the then finance minister Yashwant Sinha decided to revise the time to 11 am.
At 11 am on February 27, 1999, Sinha, the finance minister in the administration headed by Atal Bihari Vajpayee, unveiled India's inaugural budget. Since India was no longer a British territory and did not need to adjust to London's time zone, this shift was significant.

Moreover, as Sinha argued, it allowed more time for parliamentary debate and discussion on the Budget and analysing numbers. All Union Budgets have been delivered at 11:00 am since 1999. As per custom, Sitharaman will deliver the budget on Tuesday at 11:00 a.m. On July 22, the yearly economic survey will be delivered, one day before to the budget.

Did you know the Union Budget was not always presented on February 1? Historically, it had been presented on the last working day of February. This remained the standard until 2017. In 2017, Arun Jaitley, the late finance minister, broke with tradition by presenting the budget on February 1.
He said that the administration had limited time to put new policies and adjustments into effect by April 1 because the budget was presented at the end of February. The budget presentation was rescheduled for February 1 as a result.
And with this, the Narendra Modi-led government shed another colonial legacy.

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