Tue. Mar 19th, 2024

New Delhi: The Union Minister for Finance and Corporate Affairs Nirmala Sitharaman Monday held the pre-budget consultations with the Finance Ministers of States and Union Territories (with Legislature).

The meeting was held through a Video Conference and was attended by Chief Ministers, the Deputy Chief Ministers, Finance Ministers, Ministers and Senior Officers from the States/Union Territories and the Union Government.

The Finance Ministry tweeted, “Union Finance Minister Smt. @nsitharaman holds a Pre-Budget meeting for the upcoming Budget 2021-22 with Finance Ministers of all States and Union Territories (with legislature) through video conferencing in New Delhi today. Along with Finance Minister Smt. @nsitharaman, Finance Secretary Dr. A.B. Pandey; Secretary, Expenditure, Shri T.V. Somanathan; Secretary, DEA, Shri Tarun Bajaj; CEA Shri @SubramanianKri besides other senior officials are also present in the meeting.”

As per the PIB press release, Dr. A.B. Pandey, the Union Finance Secretary informed the importance of this particular consultation meeting.

Sitharaman highlighted the importance of this meeting as a sign of cooperative federalism and indicated how the Union Government was strongly supportive of the States/Union Territories (with Legislature) fighting against the pandemic.

Earlier, the Finance Minister virtually chaired a series of pre-Budget meetings for Budget 2021-22, from December 14-23. Various stakeholders gave a lot of suggestions concerning fiscal policy, taxation, and green growth during the customary pre-budget meetings. More than 170 invitees representing nine stakeholder groups participated in 15 virtual meetings. The meeting with state finance ministers is the 16th meeting.

The participants also gave numerous suggestions to the Union Finance Minister for inclusion in the Budget Speech. The union budget will be presented on February 1.