Finance Bill 2026: Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, while replying to the discussion in the House on Finance Bill 2026, made a sharp attack on the opposition. He said on Wednesday that earlier economic reforms were done out of compulsion, but now they are being implemented with determination and commitment. He said that the country is now moving forward with speed and continuity riding on the “Reform Express”.

Ease of living improved

The Finance Minister said that the government is continuously taking steps to develop the country and fulfill the aspirations of 140 crore Indians. He said that work has been done on trust based tax system, so that honest taxpayers do not face any kind of problem.

Sitharaman also said that some members of the opposition made fun of ‘Ease of Living’ and ‘Ease of Doing Business’, but the government is continuously improving in both these areas. He said that we are empowering MSME farmers and cooperative sector, because they are very important for the development of the country. Provisions have been made in the Finance Bill to strengthen them.

data center in use

The Finance Minister said that emphasis is also being laid on making India a global business center and many important provisions have been made for the middle class in this Finance Bill. He said that to provide relief to the common people, 17 life-saving medicines have been exempted from basic customs duty.

He also said that the amount in excess of the revenue collected from cess and surcharge has been transferred to the states under various heads. Also, an investment of $17 billion is being used in the data center sector in the country, which is a big step towards strengthening the digital infrastructure.

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Union budget 2026: The Central Government is presenting the country’s General Budget 2026 in the Parliament today, Sunday, February 1, at 11 am. For the last few years, it has become a tradition to present the budget on 1st February and in the same sequence, last year’s Union Budget 2025 was also tabled in the Parliament on the same date. This time’s budget is also special because Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is presenting it for the ninth consecutive time. With this, she will join the list of select finance ministers who have presented the budget without any gap for the longest time, which is considered to be a record in itself. In this sequence, it is also important to know how many budgets have been presented on which days from Monday to Saturday after independence.

How many budgets on which day since independence?

The Union Budget 2026 is being presented in Parliament today, Sunday, February 1, at 11 am. This is the second time after independence that the country’s general budget is being presented on Sunday. Before this, most of the budgets were presented in Parliament between Monday and Saturday. If we look at the figures, till now the budget has been presented maximum 21 times on Monday, whereas the budget has been presented 11 times on Tuesday, 18 on Wednesday, 10 on Thursday, 17 on Friday and 17 on Saturday. Presenting the budget on a Sunday is still considered a rare occurrence.

Presenting budget on weekend is not a new tradition

Although presenting the budget on Sunday is a topic of discussion, the trend of presenting the budget on the weekend has been seen earlier also. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented Budget 2025 on Saturday. Before him, former Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had also presented the budget on 28 February in the years 2015 and 2016 and both times that day was Saturday. It is clear from this that the budget deadline and preparation are more important than the day for the government.

Nirmala Sitharaman’s ninth consecutive budget

Budget 2026 is the ninth consecutive budget of Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. With this, she will join those select finance ministers who have presented the budget the maximum number of times without any gap. In 2019, after the NDA government came back to power under the leadership of Narendra Modi, she was made the country’s first full-time woman Finance Minister. After this, even after the Modi government returns to power for the third time in 2024, the responsibility of the Finance Ministry remains with him.

GDP estimate becomes the foundation of the budget

The preparation of Union Budget 2026 is based on recently released economic data. According to the first advance estimate released by the government on January 7, despite global economic challenges and circumstances like tariff war, India’s real GDP growth is estimated to be 7.4 percent in the financial year 2025-26. This growth rate is higher than 6.5 percent a year ago, which shows the strength of the Indian economy.

Government’s priorities and way forward

Keeping these GDP estimates and other economic indicators in mind, the outline of Budget 2026 has been prepared. It is believed that in this budget, the government will clearly put forward the strategy to strengthen domestic demand, increase investment, create employment opportunities and deal with global instability. Budget 2026 is expected to provide the government’s economic priorities, policy direction and complete development roadmap for the coming financial year.

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