Well, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, through his very long, and equally drab and listless delivery of his Budget speech, left two very diverse groups of Indians smiling.

First came the cigarette smokers; strangely enough, the Finance Minister who has cast his service tax net wider to include ‘air conditioned' hospitals and private nursing homes, and ‘air conditioned restaurants that have licence to serve liquor', spared smokers this time around.

ITC shot up

The result was that the price of ITC, which has been battered over the last couple of weeks over Budget blues, shot up by a good eight per cent on Monday.

So smoking is okay, but alcohol is not, particularly when consumed in ‘air conditioned' restaurants.

But those tipplers who gulp it down in the filthy, crowded and non-a/c environs of Tasmac (Tamil Nadu State Marketing Corporation) or ‘wine shops' in Tamil Nadu, can continue to puff away and say ‘hic' without paying any extra taxes.

Adding fragrance

And now, with attar sellers getting some tax sops too, tipplers at Tasmac outlets can dab a bit of fragrance before their revelry!

Very senior citizens

The other group which will profusely thank Pranab Babu is the category classified as “very senior citizens” or those above 80; for them income up to Rs 5 lakh is tax free.

If you're wondering which is the single largest group that will benefit from this largesse, don't look beyond the political class… our Parliamentarians and legislators are bound to heap a rich harvest from this bounty.

But alas, money kept in Swiss and other foreign banks will not fetch this benefit. But then, where is the need for tax exemption for zero tax money?

Also, for tax relief purposes, a full five years have been chopped off from the “senior citizen category”, and for this largesse, ordinary Indians over 60, for whom the Bharat Sarkar offers little except discounted rail tickets and half a per cent more on bank FDs, will be eternally grateful.

Pension for BPL beneficiaries in both the categories has been increased too.

Concrete proposals for less privileged

Sniping and sniggering aside, the Finance Minister has indeed made some concrete proposals to directly help the less privileged sectors, for which he deserves praise.

Increase in allocation of welfare schemes

Increase in the allocation of welfare schemes, even by hundreds of crores of rupees, always comes with a question mark on how much of it would be siphoned off by corrupt politicians, bureaucrats and their lackeys.

But direct measures such as making agricultural credit cheaper, or doubling the wages of anganwadi workers (from Rs 1,500 to Rs 3,000) and helpers (Rs 750 to 1,500) to benefit 22 lakh people, will directly impact their lives.

India Microfinance Equity Fund

With the microfinance industry in India in turmoil, with the misdeeds of a few adversely affecting millions of genuine small borrowers, almost all of them women, the creation of a Rs 100 crore India Microfinance Equity Fund, and the proposal to create a Rs 500 crore women's self help groups' development fund, are welcome features.

For anyone who has personally assessed the kind of change microcredit brings into the lives of very poor women and their families, the present strangulation of the entire microfinance programme to punish a few black sheep, is like throwing the baby along with the bath water.

But the most disappointing aspect of the Budget, presented by a Government tainted by numerous mega scams, has to do with corruption.

Can any Indian have a vaguer promise than “a group of ministers will be constituted to consider measures for tackling corruption.”

It's like taking turns to play the chor-sipahi game.

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