Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, while making Budget 2023 announcements, said that Rs 2 lakh crore for the entire year will be borne by the central government under 'PM Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana'. This scheme is aimed at supplying free food grains for one year to all Antyodaya and priority households, FM said.
The Cabinet in January merged the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Ann Yojana with the National Food Security Act till December 2023. The scheme has benefited more than 80 crore poor and poorest of poor people since its the implementation from January 1, 2023.
The Finance Minister presented her fourth full budget and last budget in the Modi 2.0 government ahead of the general elections in 2024. Sitharaman said the mission of the government is to achieve knowledge-driven economy.
She further said Indian economy has become more formalised as witnessed by significant enhancement in digital payments. The economy has increased in size from being tenth to 5th largest in the world in the last nine years
Institutional credit in agriculture sector grew as much as Rs 18.6 lakh crore in FY22 from Rs 15.8 lakh crore in FY21. Initiatives such as PM-KSIAN, PM-Fasal Bima Yojana and forming agriculture infrastructure fund have provided much needed support to the sector.
At the same time the role of digital infrastructure in socio-economic development has gathered increased importance and India positioned itself strongly as a knowledge hub.
The focus of digital India programme rests on providing high speed internet as a core utility to citizens for delivering services, creating unique digital identity, providing shareable private space on public cloud (digitally store certificate and documents).
Meanwhile, agriculture and allied sector growth has been buoyant through the years on the back of the measures adopted by the government to augment crop and livestock productivity, returns to farmers through price support and by promoting crop diversification. Private investment in agriculture sector has increased by 9.3 percent in FY21 (7 percent in FY20), according to PTI report.
-With inputs from PTI
