Coming to the political criticism, I have to deal with them. But I would deal very briefly. There has been a criticism that this budget is a capitalist budget. I would say that it was merely an ideological, a parrot-like repetition, of the old thing. Some Hon. Members illustrated it also. They said that it was a capitalist budget because there was an increase in the defence budget of this country, because there was provision for police in this country and so on. Now, do those parties want our security to be safe or not?
West Bengal has been the home of patriots at whose feet all of us should sit and learn. What happened to a man like Hemant Kumar Basu? He was killed in broad day-light in the streets of Calcutta, and not a single man was coming forward to give evidence in that case. Have we come to that pass? If we provide for police to combat these activities, they call this a capitalist budget! Why do they call it a capitalist budget? Their main difficulty is this. Our main attack in this budget is on poverty. What is poverty? It was Prof. Dandekar who has mentioned in his book - I may tell Shri Unni Krishnan who referred to this that I have also read that book and I agree with his assessment - that, really speaking, the problem of poverty in this country is a problem of slow development, and unequal distribution of income and wealth.
I have read Marx. But unfortunately I have tried to understand Marx intelligently, not blindly. In the context of the change that has taken place, in the situation in the world today, though the basic analysis in certain matter still remains true and valid the way they are trying to apply it to Indian conditions merely shows that they have forgotten their roots in India. They are misled by certain ideologies which, really speaking, seem to be un-Indian in nature. I do not want to say anything more about it.
Coming now to the political criticism of my Hon. friend, the leader of the Congress (Q) Shri Shyamnandan Mishra, the first sentence of his budget speech was that this budget ‘is a gift to the opposition parties.’ If it is a gift to the opposition parties, I have made it; and I have made that gift, free of tax.
The main point is this. Now, the nation has made certain commitments. Let us not try to judge budget from a merely narrow party politics angle.
My main point is that this is a commitment which this nation has made. We have set ourselves on the march towards achievement of socialism in this country. This commitment has to be fulfilled and I am glad that by this one Budget I can humbly claim that on that long, hard and tortuous journey we have taken one very definite and positive step forward. Sir, I have done.