Parliamentary committees won't scrutinise Budget 2009

For the first time in recent history, the Union Budget will be passed without the statutory scrutiny by the parliamentary standing committees of various ministries

Paucity of time has forced the United Progressive Alliance government to approach the Opposition for the passage of the FY09-10 Budget in July without scrutiny.

Pranab Mukherjee, it is learnt, is in touch with Bharatiya Janata Party and the Communist Party of India (Marxist), while Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pawan Kumar Bansal and Commerce and Industries Minister Anand Sharma have been asked to liaise with the smaller parties to ensure the Budget moves smoothly through Parliament.

Under a practice adopted a few years ago, Parliament adjourns for three to four weeks after the first stage discussion of the Budget to let small committees of MPs scrutinise the Budget proposals in detail before they are returned to the Lower House for passage.

The government's stand is that there is no time for such an elaborate exercise this time as the vote-on-account taken in February is valid only until July 31 and the Budget needs to be passed before that date.

Since Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee has already declared that he is preparing for the presentation of the Budget in the first week of July, it can be passed in another three weeks only by eliminating the standing committees' scrutiny and discussing it in Parliament, mainly in the Lok Sabha. The government's financial business does not require passage by the Upper House.

The government could have come up with another vote-on-account to have sufficient time for the main Budget, but it does not want to delay unleashing a slew of fiscal measures and reforms that can take care of the economic slowdown to some extent.

Bansal had called on Opposition leader Lal Krishna Advani to seek his cooperation in bypassing the standing committee route of the Budget. His plea was that the Lok Sabha will be able to discuss the Budget sufficiently before it is put to vote, hence the standing committees can be dispensed with as a one-time exception.

Mukherjee is already working in tandem with Sharma to decide the Budget concessions that can help the sectors still under recession.

While Sharma has repeatedly talked of a special package for exporters, the Budget is expected to also provide sops to the manufacturing and labour-intensive sectors as also farmers, besides giving a further boost to a score of the rural programmes taken up by the previous UPA government.