Today, when the Union Budget is presented in Parliament on February 1, it seems to be a normal process. However, hardly anyone pays attention to the story behind it. Actually, the date and time of presenting the budget were not always the same. There is a long history associated with these changes. Till a few years ago, the Union Budget was presented on 28 February. Over time, changes were made to meet the administrative and economic needs of the country. This is the reason why now the budget is presented on 1 February. Let’s know the story behind this…
Tradition of presenting the budget on 28 February
Until 2017, the Union Budget was presented every year on the last day of February. This was a tradition that had been going on since the British rule. During that time, it was believed that this was enough time to implement the budget from April 1. However, with time, this system started facing problems. The time between presenting the budget and implementing it started shortening. Due to this, states and ministries started facing problems in preparing new schemes. Often, even important files were not completed on time.
Decision to present the budget on February 1
In view of the difficulties faced in budget preparations, in 2017, the then Finance Minister Arun Jaitley took an important decision to change the date of the budget. Subsequently, the Union Budget started being presented in early February, i.e. on 1 February. This gave the central and state governments about two months to implement the schemes. This change not only made it easier to work on new schemes, but also ended an old tradition that had been going on since the British era.
Why was the timing of budget presentation changed?
In 1999, during the tenure of the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government, a change was made in the old tradition regarding the timing of presentation of the budget. Till then, the budget was presented at 5 pm, due to the influence of the British system. This was because in Britain the Budget was presented at 11 am, which was equivalent to 5 pm in India. The then Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha changed this system and decided to present the budget at 11 am. He believed that if the budget was presented early in the day, Members of Parliament, experts and the general public would get the entire day to understand and discuss it. Since then, the Union Budget in India is presented at 11 am.
