Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, while presenting the Union Budget 2024, on Tuesday announced the provisioning of Rs 11,11,111 crore for capital expenditure.
It will be 3.4% of the country’s GDP, and the government will endeavour to maintain strong fiscal support for infrastructure over the next five years, she said.
The minister also said the government would pursue a broad path of fiscal consolidation to attain a level of Fiscal Deficit lower than 4.5% of GDP by FY 2025-26 with resultant consolidation of Debt to GDP ratio while continuing with its efforts to usher and sustain broad based inclusive economic growth and welfare for the people.
India’s Real growth at 8.2% and Nominal growth at 9.6% in FY 2023-24. The private consumption expenditure registered a growth of 4% in FY 2023-24, driven by resilient urban demand conditions and recovery in rural demand.
For the year 2024-25, the total receipts other than borrowings and the total expenditure are estimated at ₹32.07 lakh crore and ₹48.21 lakh crore respectively. The net tax receipts are estimated at ₹25.83 lakh crore.
The budgeted capital expenditure is almost 3.3 times of the capital expenditure in FY 2019-20 and 23% of total expenditure in BE 2024-25.
Notably, the fiscal deficit of the Union Government declines to 5.6% of GDP as per 3 Provisional Actuals (PA) published by the Controller General of Accounts (CGA), while the revenue deficit declined to 2.6% of GDP in FY 2023-24.
The gross market borrowings through dated securities are estimated at ₹14.01 lakh crore and net market borrowings at ₹11.63 lakh crore during 2024-25, less than that in 2023-24.
The major subsidies as a percent of GDP are expected to decline from 1.4% in RE of 2023-24 to 1.2% in BE of 2024- 25. Major subsidies, at ₹3.81 lakh crore, would constitute about 10.3 per cent of revenue expenditure in BE 2024-25, she said.
Further, she announced a provision of ₹1.5 lakh crore for long-term interest free loans this year to encourage the states to provide support of similar scale for infrastructure.
This will support the states in their resource allocation for infrastructure.
She said that investment in infrastructure by the private sector will be promoted through viability gap funding and enabling policies and regulations. A market-based financing framework will be brought out, she noted.
The minister also proposed the launch of Phase IV of Pradhan Mantri Gram SadakYojana (PMGSY) to provide all-weather connectivity to 25,000 rural habitations.