Budget will be driven by election motives

Finance Minister P Chidambaram will present the Union Budget on February 29. The presentation of the Budget is one of the most closely followed event in India as it affects almost every one right from the housewife, salaried class, corporates, entrepreneurs and even those who have retired.

To find out what are the expectations of the people about the budget, IBNLive organised an online chat with financial journalist Sandipan Deb on Saturday.

Here we reproduce the full text of his chat.

Sadik Ismail: What you think is the driving force behind Budget 2008? Is it the poor man, corporate, election, middle class or a consensual approach?

Sandipan Deb: I hope I am wrong but I fear that this Budget would be driven by election motives more than anything else. So expect lots of sops to the "aam aadmi", and dread the knowledge that most of the money will maybe not reach. I don't want to sound overly pessimistic, but I think this is what will happen. We are at a critical point in our economic and political history when the economy is doing marvellously but politically we are fragmented. I think it will be a politician's budget, not an economist's. read full story