AGARTALA, July 6 (TIWN): Tripura Finance Minister Jishnu Dev Barman has commented about Budget 2019 as historical.

He said, this budget has opened opportunities for farmers, rural areas people including Janajati. He appreciated the decision of building up Eklavya schools in each 20,000 populated areas.

“The proposed Budget 2019-20 has historic allocation for the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare: Rs 1,30,485 crore —the highest-ever”, Debbarman said.

It can be recalled, that in 2014-15, when Narendra Modi first became prime minister, the agriculture ministry was allocated Rs 31,063 crore. It received Rs 79,026 crore, according to the revised estimates of 2018-19.

The allocation proposed by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her maiden budget speech represents a 140 per cent jump over the ’18-19 budget estimate of Rs 57,600 crore. This leap is mostly due to the staggering Rs 75,000 crore allocated to the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-Kisan). Of the agriculture ministry’s budget, 57 per cent is now for direct cash assistance to farmers.

In its interim budget just before the elections, the National Democratic Alliance government declared this income assistance scheme with retrospective effect. In the budget for 2018-19, thus, Rs 20,000 crore was allocated. The PM-Kisan scheme provides a Rs 6,000 in income support to each farmer in three instalments of Rs 2,000 each.

The historic allocation, however, is still less than Rs 10,000 crore of what was proposed in the interim budget.

Average annual growth rate in real terms in agricultural and allied sectors has remained around 2.88 per cent (2014-15 to 2018-19). Besides, rural wages continue to stagnate. These have led to an overall decline in rural consumption as people have less to spend.