Budget 2016: Jamaat-e-Islami Hind forwards suggestions to govt for Budget 2016-17

Mumbai: The Jamaat-e-Islami Hind (JIH) has made some suggestions related to social sector, rural development and interest-free farm credit for inclusion in the Budget for 2016-17. A meeting of JIH’s national office-bearers held at its headquarters here deliberated on issues related to the national budget and adopted a resolution to forward the four suggestions for the 2016-17 budget. [caption id=“attachment_2540828” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational image, Reuters[/caption] According to JIH Secretary Intizar Naeem, the suggestions are based on social sectors, rural development, resource generation, interest-free credit, among others. The organisation has asked Finance Minister Arun Jaitley for greater allocation to social sectors. “Even sectors where parity is maintained, the incremental cost on account of inflation should be added,” Naeem said. The ever-increasing role of private sector in education and healthcare has led to a spiralling increase in the cost of these services, taking these facilities out of the reach of the common man. “There is a need for taking these services out of PPP mode and increasing the government’s role in their development,” he said. “We have suggested allocation of 6 per cent of GDP on education and 3 per cent of GDP on healthcare,” he said. Development of urban areas is welcome but this should not impinge upon rural development, Naeem said, suggesting that rural areas should be developed while keeping them rural and not making them urban. By providing primary facilities like electricity, sanitation, education and healthcare, the pace of migration from villages to towns and cities may be slowed down, he said. “There is every possibility of witnessing a U-turn in migration if this is adopted properly. The government should not leave this task to panchayats or state governments but should show the way by positive indulgence,” he said. The budget 2007-08 had brought in the concept of interest-free credits. “We do not know why the idea did not click and was not continued in later years. We propose for interest-free mode of finance for farm credit,” Naeem said. “The dilemma of farm-credit today is that a number of suicides are attributable to the interest-based loans and in many cases the governments have written-off both principals and compound interests on the unrecoverable loans. Interest- free farm credit may be a solution to the problem,” he suggested. PTI