Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented her second budget on Saturday (February 1) for the financial year beginning April 1. Following are some excerpts from her budget speech that focused on the development of infrastructure, culture and tourism.
Infrastructure
Accelerated development of highways will be undertaken. This will include development of 2500 Km access control highways, 9000 Km of economic corridors, 2000 Km of coastal and land port roads and 2000 Km of strategic highways.
Delhi-Mumbai Expressway and two other packages would be completed by 2023. Chennai-Bengaluru Expressway would also be started.
• Four station re-development projects and operation of 150 passenger trains would be done through PPP mode. The process of inviting private participation is underway.
• More Tejas type trains will connect iconic tourist destinations.
• High speed train between Mumbai to Ahmedabad would be actively pursued.
• 148 km long Bengaluru Suburban transport project at a cost of Rs. 18600 crore, would have fares on metro model. Central Government would provide 20% of equity and facilitate external assistance up to 60% of the project cost.
Inland Waterways received a boost in the last five years. The Jal Vikas Marg on National Waterway-1 will be completed. Further, the 890 Km Dhubri-Sadiya connectivity will be done by 2022.
Air traffic has been growing rapidly in the country as compared to global average. One hundred more airports would be developed by 2024 to support Udaan scheme. It is expected that the air fleet number shall go up from the present 600 to 1200 during this time.
I propose to provide about Rs. 1.70 lakh crore for transport Infrastructure in 2020-21.
Culture & Tourism
Our government proposes to establish an Indian Institute of Heritage and Conservation under Ministry of Culture; it shall have the status of a deemed University to start with. Acquisition of knowledge in disciplines such as museology and archaeology are essential for collecting and analysing scientific evidence of such findings and for dissemination through high quality museums. Currently lack of trained man-power is a handicap for both these disciplines. This also affects tourism.
Five archaeological sites would be developed as iconic sites with on-site Museums. They are: Rakhigarhi (Haryana), Hastinapur (Uttar Pradesh) Shivsagar (Assam), Dholavira (Gujarat) and Adichanallur (Tamil Nadu).
Our Prime Minister in January 2020 announced re-curation of the Indian Museum in Kolkata, which is the oldest in the country.
In the historic Old Mint building Kolkata, a museum on Numismatics and Trade will also be located. Four more museums from across the country shall be taken up for renovation and re-curation so that a world class experience can be offered to visitors. Our government shall also support setting up of a Tribal Museum in Ranchi (Jharkhand).
A maritime museum would be set up at Lothal- the Harrapan age maritime site near Ahmedabad, by Ministry of Shipping.
I propose to provide Rs. 3,150crore for Ministry of Culture for 2020-21.
India has moved up from rank 65 in 2014 to 34 in 2019 in the Travel & Tourism Competitive Index (World Economic Forum). Foreign exchange earnings grew 7.4% to Rs. 1.88 lakh crores for the period January to November 2019 from Rs. 1.75 lakh crores
The growth of tourism directly relates to growth and employment. States have a critical role to play. I expect the State governments to develop a roadmap for certain identified destinations and formulate financial plans during 2021 against which specified grants will be made available to the States in 2020-21. For purpose of tourism promotion, I propose to allocate Rs. 2,500 crore for 2020-21.