 "Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presents 2025 Union Budget. ANI")
The fiscal deficit for FY25 has been pegged at 4.8 per cent of GDP and at 4.4 per cent for FY26, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Saturday.
Presenting the Budget 2025-26, she said net market borrowings are estimated at Rs 11.54 lakh crore for next fiscal year.
The Union Budget 2024, presented in July, estimated fiscal deficit to be 4.9 per cent of the GDP. The revised estimates for FY 2023-24 showed that the fiscal deficit was 5.8 per cent of the GDP, while the budget estimates for FY 2023-24 were 5.9 per cent.
The finance minister also said the government will set up a high-level committee for regulatory reforms on all non-financial sectors.
She also said NaBFID (National Bank for Financing Infrastructure and Development) will set up partial credit enhancement facility for corporate bonds.
Investment friendliness index of states will be launched this year, Sitharaman further said.
Sitharaman on Saturday made history as she presented a record eighth consecutive budget, which comes in the backdrop of slowdown in economy and demand for tax cuts for middle class.
This will take Sitharaman closer to the record of 10 budgets that were presented by former Prime Minister Morarji Desai over different time periods.
Desai has presented a total of 6 budgets during his tenure as finance minister from 1959 to 1964, and 4 budgets between 1967 and 1969.
With inputs from agencies