Government’s priority is to give relief to citizens, even if it means worrying about revenue later, said Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
“If some states are worried, and if the Centre is also going to have to be worried, saying, how will we get the revenue now? We will have to give the respite to the citizen first. And then worry about our revenue, how to mobilize it, where to get it from,” Sitharaman said.
She recalled lessons from the Covid-19 pandemic, when the government chose to prioritise people’s needs over revenue constraints. “Even then, a leader like Prime Minister Modi did not waver. He didn’t say, oh, what will happen now? On the top of it, he said, I don’t want you to search for revenue anywhere, but I want to give free vaccination to the people of our country. One hundred forty billion, two doses will be free,” she said.
Sitharaman added that while the Centre carries exclusive responsibilities such as defense spending, it is willing to borrow and adjust when citizens’ welfare is at stake.
