New Delhi: Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, who unveiled the Union Budget 2016-17 in Lok Sabha on Monday, made no mention of defence allocation, thus raising many eyebrows.
However, it is still unclear that why the Finance Minister didn't mention anything about defence expenditure, especially at the time when the Indian military establishment is focussing on modernising its infantry and weaponry.
Jaitley had last year increased the defence spending to 2.47 trillion Indian rupees (USD 40.07 billion). Earlier, it was 2.29 trillion rupees.
The defence expenditure was increased by 26.29 percent in 2004-05 in comparison to the preceding year. Such an increase was only witnessed in 2008-09 and 2009-10, when the growth was 24.59 percent and 24.13 percent.
However, in 2010-11, there was a decline of 8.70 percent. Though there have been slight increment in subsequent years, these never touched the levels of 2004-05, 2008-09 and 2009-10.
During 2011-12 and 2012-13, the increase was 10.90 percent and 6.36 percent.
In 2013-14, the growth was 12.05 percent, in 2014-15 it was 12.44 percent and in 2015-16 it was around 11 percent.
