Union Budget strikes the right chords

by Mr Aditya Narayan Mishra, CEO, CIEL HR Services (Ma Foi Group)
The Budget highlights the core sectors of the economy such as Agriculture and farmers, Livelihood in rural India and Social sector spends such as healthcare, education apart from the usual topics of job creation, skilling, taxation, fiscal prudence, environment, safety and security.

The outlays announced on roads, highways, railways, ports and airports are heartening. The devil lies in the details. So, we need to see how well these announcements play out on the ground. If finances for all these investments are garnered and the stakeholders for each of them work in unison, the projects will see the light of the day. These projects could generate at least half a million direct jobs and more than 1 million of indirect jobs.

We see proposals in education across the spectrum from school levels to higher education. While these are on the expected lines, some of the seemingly trivial points such as digital repository of educational certificates, PF contribution by Govt to first-time salaried employees for 3 years, online courses on entrepreneurship, National Board of Skill Development Certification etc could bring in small yet effective measures for the employer organizations. Again one would want to see the details of implementation of such programmes. The moot point is to make sure that the programmes budget is not very explicit about the plans to make sure that we are creating jobs for the 10 million pass-outs each year and have the skills that industry is looking for.

Focus on rural India will hopefully bridge the skill gaps, develop new rural infrastructure, help the farmers sell their produce at the right prices, have some sense of security against the damages, make sure that the subsidies and benefits reach the right people. If backed up by a rigorous execution process, we can hope to see job creation and inclusive growth.