Budget 2025: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, who has, so far, presented a total of seven straight budgets under the Modi government, including an interim one in February 2024, is set to table her eighth consecutive budget on February 1 (Saturday). In 2020, Sitharaman created a unique record for delivering the longest budget speech as Union Finance Minister in the Parliament.
The budget 2020-21 speech continued over 2 hours 42 minutes spelling out 13,128 words. The speech started at 11 am and extended until 1.40 pm, which means Sitharaman spoke for 2 hours and 42 minutes. The budget speech could have been prolonged more but due to health issues, she had to cut short. The remaining two pages of the speech were read by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla.
Sitharaman, in the longest budget speech, focussed on creating better standards of health, education, job creation, expansion of the national gas grid and development of one hundred more airports, the announcement of the tax charter.
Significantly, Sitharaman’s first budget speech was also a long one. While presenting budget 2019-20, she spoke for two hours and 17 minutes in the Lok Sabha.
In 2022, the finance minister delivered one-and-a-half hours budget speech, which was her shortest-ever budget speech.
Interestingly, the most 8,650-word budget speech record is not held by Sitharaman but by Finance Minister Manmohan Singh. The historic budget of 1991 marked a turning point in the economic revolution of India. The budget 1991 paved the way for economic liberalisation in India which later turned out to be a game changer.
Who holds the record for shortest budget speech?
In 1997, Finance Minister Hirubhai M Patel delivered the shortest budget speech in the Parliament. The speech was just 800 words.
Also read: Budget 2025: What does healthcare sector want apart from tax reform and innovative push?
