Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman today presented her sixth budget. Of these, five were full budget and one interim budget that was presented today. The interim budget speech by FM Sitharaman lasted for around 60 minutes today. While this was expected given it was a vote on account budget, this marked Sitharaman's shortest budget. Sitharaman's 2020 budget speech holds the record for being the longest in history, lasting a total of 162 minutes or two hours and 42 minutes.
In 2023, her budget speech was one hour and 25 minutes long. In 2022, her speech lasted for one hour 3o minutes while in 2021, it lasted for one hour 50 minutes. In 2019, it was two hours and 17 minutes long.
Congress MP Shashi Tharoor said that it was one of the shortest speeches on record in the Budget and not very much came out of it. "As usual, a lot of rhetorical language, very little concrete on implementation...She talked about foreign investment without acknowledging that that investment has come down significantly....This is going to be a very disappointing speech in terms of being couched entirely in generalities and without enough substance nor any willingness to address the specific problems of the economy," said Tharoor.
While FM Sitharaman disappointed salaried taxpayers, she also announced relief for around one crore taxpayers in terms of tax dispute cases. Sitharaman said that tax disputes amounting up to Rs 25,000 would be waived off, giving relief to around one crore taxpayers.
