What young India wants from '08 Budget?

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As Finance Minister P Chidambaram gets ready to present Budget 2008-09 on February 29, CNBC-TV18 gets you a sense of what young India really wants.

Faster and inclusive growth, that’s what young India and young CEOs wanted from the Finance Minister in the last Budget.

This year, the focus is on agricultural reforms, on strengthening infrastructure and R&D and widening the tax base.

Finance Minister P Chidambaram has said, “The year 2007-08, will mark the beginning of the 11th plan. The declared objective is faster and more inclusive growth. I can state with confidence that in the eve of the plan, the economy is in a stronger position then ever before, it therefore beholds us to set higher goals. The approach paper to the 11th plan states that the plan ‘will aim at putting the economy on a sustainable growth trajectory, with a growth rate of approximately 10%, by the end of its period.”

“The economy is set to grow as robustly, as it will, it’ll take a heavy toll on the environment in both, the way goods are created and goods are used. I hope that in this budget or in the subsequent one, the finance minister will bring in this aspect as to how we protect our environment as we grow, because ultimately it’s supposed to be about quality of life,” Rajiv Bajaj, MD, Bajaj Auto, said.

Making his wish list Rajiv Memani, Country Managing Partner, E&Y India, said, “Reducing the custom duty would be the biggest step and that’s what he will try and target through the Budget.”

Anuj Gupta, CEO, Final Quadrant Solutions, is of the view, “Some system of access to information, that’s been the key success factor to the developed parts of the world. People are spreading on more information than we are and I think that’s some thing that the government should look at.”

Vivek Agarwal, CEO, Liqvid, said, “There is an example that I read, Bhutan for improving the public system of education, made it compulsory for all bureaucrats and ministers to send their children to the government schools where they were actually being run.”

ID Musafir, Director, M & B Footwear, believes, “The divide between the haves and the have-nots is going to increase, so unless you provide basic employment to the masses of India, and learn from examples like China, where everything co-exists, I think this is what the Finance Minister should look at.”

Farzana Haque, Head- Retail & CPG Group, TCS, said, “We are looking at India as a manufacturing hub for small cars, we are looking at semi-conductors, so there are some industries that need their incentive.”

From a population of 1.2 billion in India, only 35% have access to healthcare, in fact the government has made health care one of its top priorities.

With the beginning of the 11th five-year plan, the budget allocation for health and family welfare has been increased by 21.9% to Rs 15,291 crore, but this is just still 0.9% of the GDP, the focus of the government has been on providing primary rural health care through national rural healthcare missions.