The Budget had but one item of note, the government’s intention to sell its stakes in LIC. This is a step that marks in purple the complete surrender of this government to the challenges of reviving a neglected economy. The tax revisions were as bad. They would encourage the newly employed youth to spend more while dismaying the middle-aged, whose thrift is not only getting ignored but now being frowned upon. The handsome household savings that wrote the growth story in the 1990s will no longer play an active role in an already moribund economy.
R. Narayanan,
Navi Mumbai
