Union Budget 2024: Nirmala Sitharaman To Make History With Seventh Consecutive Budget Presentation

Union Budget 2024: Nirmala Sitharaman will surpass former Prime Minister Morarji Desai's record, who delivered five full Budgets and one Interim Budget between 1959 and 1964

Union Budget 2024: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is all set to create history as she presents her seventh straight Budget on Tuesday for the fiscal year 2024-25, surpassing the record of former Prime Minister Morarji Desai. Appointed in 2019 as India's first full-time woman finance minister under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s second term, Sitharaman, who will turn 65 next month, has consistently presented the Union Budget, including an interim one this February.

This upcoming full Budget for the fiscal year 2024-25 (April 2024 to March 2025) will be her seventh consecutive presentation. She will surpass Desai’s record, who delivered five full Budgets and one Interim Budget between 1959 and 1964.

Two Budgets in a Year

This year marks the presentation of two Budgets – an interim one in February and tomorrow’s full Budget (July 23). An incumbent government is restricted from presenting a full Budget just before general elections. The July 23 presentation will be the first Budget by the BJP-led NDA government since its re-election last month.

Historical Facts on Budget Presentations in Independent India

First Budget: The first-ever Union Budget of independent India was presented on November 26, 1947, by the nation’s first finance minister, RK Shanmukham Chetty.

Most Number of Budgets: Former Prime Minister Morarji Desai holds the record for presenting the most budgets, with a total of 10. His first budget was on February 28, 1959. He presented full budgets for the next two years, followed by an interim budget in 1962 and two more full budgets. He later presented another interim budget in 1967 and three full budgets from 1967 to 1969.

Second Highest Number of Budgets: Former finance minister P Chidambaram presented the budget on nine occasions, starting on March 19, 1996, during the United Front government. He continued as finance minister under the Congress-led UPA, presenting five budgets between 2004 and 2008, and two more in 2013 and 2014.

Third Highest Number of Budgets: Pranab Mukherjee delivered eight budgets, with three between 1982 and 1984 and five consecutive budgets from February 2009 to March 2012 under the Congress-led UPA government.

Manmohan Singh: Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh presented five straight budgets from 1991 to 1995 as finance minister in the PV Narasimha Rao government.

Longest Budget Speech: Sitharaman holds the record for the longest Budget speech, lasting two hours and 40 minutes on February 1, 2020. She had to cut her speech short, with two pages still remaining.

Shortest Budget Speech: The shortest Budget speech was by Hirubhai Mulljibhai Patel, delivering an interim Budget in 1977 in just 800 words.

Changes in Budget Presentation Traditions

The Budget was traditionally presented at 5 pm on the last day of February, aligning with the colonial era practice to synchronise with announcements in London. In 1999, the timing was changed to 11 am by then finance minister Yashwant Sinha in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government. Since then, Budgets are presented at 11 am.

In 2017, the presentation date was moved to February 1, allowing the government to complete the parliamentary approval process by March-end and enable the Budget's implementation from the start of the fiscal year on April 1. This change avoided delays in Budget implementation due to the previously longer approval process.