Union Budget 2025: Interesting facts you need to know

New Delhi: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is slated to present the Union Budget 2025 on February 1 in the Parliament. This will be the second Budget by the BJP-led NDA government since it was re-elected last year.

This year, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will become the first finance minister in India’s history to deliver eight  consecutive budgets. She will surpass the record previously held by Morarji Desai, who presented six consecutive budgets between 1959 and 1963.

According to Article 112 of the Constitution, the government is required to present a statement of estimated income and expenses for each financial year, which runs from April 1 to March 31, to the Parliament.

Interesting Facts about India’s Union Budget:

The first budget of India was presented around 160 years ago on April 7, 1860. It was East India Company’s James Wilson who presented the first budget to the British Crown then.

The first Union Budget of independent India was presented by RK Shanmukham Chetty on November 26, 1947.

Morarji Desai presented a total of 10 budgets, which marks to be the most offered by a single person.

awaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi are the only Prime Ministers who have presented the budget.

Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was the one who gave the longest budget speech (in terms of number of words) in 1991 during his tenure as the Finance Minister.

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Till 2016, the Union Budget was presented on the last working day of February, which was then changed by the Former Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in 2017.

Later in 2017, it was the first time when the Railway Budget was merged with the Union Budget.

Present Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is the one who has given the longest budget speech so far. She spoke for 2.42 hours while presenting the Union Budget in 2020.

On February 1, 2021, the Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented the first paperless budget.

Until 1999, the Union Budget used to be announced at 5:00 pm which was said to be a colonial tradition. Then finance minister Yashwant Sinha starting 2001 changed the timing to 11 am.

A week before presenting the Budget, a ‘Halwa ceremony’ takes place where the finance minister distributes ‘Halwa’ among ministry officials and staff.