Union Budget 2025

The Union Budget outlines the trajectory of the larger economy, which also heavily impacts investor sentiment, and by extension, the stock market as well. There are a variety of ways a budget can impact the stock market, here’s an article that summarises how a budget can impact the stock market. 

In simple words, a government budget is a comprehensive financial plan that outlines the projection of the central/state government’s revenue (like corporate tax, income tax) and expenditure (like healthcare spending, education spending, social benefits) for a financial year. The government implements its economic policy through the budget.

And while the Union Budget is also a type of government budget, a government budget is a more generic term, which may also be used to describe a budget prepared by a local or State Government. However, the Union Budget is only prepared by the Central Government.

An economic survey is a detailed document that reviews a country’s economic performance over a specific period, usually a financial year. In addition to assessing a country’s economic performance, an economic survey also helps:

• Identify economic challenges and opportunities
• Inform policy decisions
• Provide a macroeconomic overview
• Offer a sectoral analysis for various sectors

The Finance Bill is a part of the Union Budget that outlines the government’s financial policy on key fronts such as taxation, revenue generation, fiscal policy, social welfare allocation, and broader economic reforms.

R.K. Shanmukham Chetty, who presented independent India’s first ever budget (on 26^th November 1947), is known as the Father of the Union Budget. He served as India’s first finance minister.

As per Article 77(3), the Finance Minister is responsible to prepare and present the annual financial statement, which is commonly known as the Budget.

R.K. Shanmukham Chetty - who served as independent India’s first finance minister – presented India’s first ever Union Budget on 26^th November 1947, shortly after it gained independence.

As far as budget speeches are concerned, the Union Budget speech of 2020, presented by Nirmala Sitharaman, holds the record for being the longest budget speech on record. The marathon speech lasted for 2 hours and 42 minutes.

But when it comes to the longest budget speech in terms of word count, that record is currently held by Dr. Manmohan Singh, who presented the epochal 1991 Budget speech, which had a word count of a whopping 18,650 words.

The Finance Minister presents the Union Budget in the Lok Sabha.

A total of 87 Budgets have been presented thus far, of which 73 have been full budgets while 14 have been interim budgets.

The current Finance Minister of India is Mrs. Nirmala Sitharaman. She assumed office in May 2019, succeeding Mr. Arun Jaitley.