Date and time: 11th February 2019 at 2 – 4 pm 
Venue: Sky View, Central Block

The Department of Economics, Christ (Deemed to be University) organised a Panel Discussion to analyse the Union Budget of 2019 on the 11th February 2019 between 2pm and 4pm at Sky View, Central Block. The Panellists for this discussion were Dr. Rahul Lahoti, professor at Azim Premzji University, Prof. Gayathri from Indian Institute for Social and Economic Change and Dr. Navin Jha, Professor at Christ. The session began with an introduction of speakers by Prof. Greeshma Manoj. The event was attended by the faculty members of the Department of Economics, students of Masters Programmes and final year students of the Undergraduate courses. 
The introductory speech was given by Professor Gerard Rassendran, the moderator for the session, a political economy perspective of the budget emerged. The major points elucidated include the omissions by the budget and how it comes about as a doling out of the public given the upcoming general election. The general takeaway was that the budget is a populist one used as propaganda for the general elections. However, there was also a consensus that there are several takeaways with regard to the state of the economy and schemes that have rolled out. 
The first speaker for the session was Dr. Rahul Lahoti, who presented a context to understanding the budget. This becomes very important as the context explains a lot about the nature of the promises that have been made and the timing of these promises. The nature of political and economic unrest becomes important for the budget given the demand for reservations, the increasing farmer unrest and the like. The major schemes that were discussed were the PM Kisan Samman Nidhi, Ayushman Bharat and PM Matru Vandhana Yojana and the major highlight were in the implementations backlogs and underfunding of these programmes. The speaker was critical about how the government is going to go about with these schemes and how effective would it is to implement programmes that are underfunded. 
The second speaker for the session was Prof. Gayathri who discussed primarily in terms of the fiscal deficit and pressure that a budget would create on the debt and borrowing culture of the government. The fiscal discipline of the economy and the budget become important to understand because it would be unsustainable to use borrowing for the payment of revenue expenditure as the borrowing come with interest payment and revenue expenditure do not result in income generation. This is a different perspective to look at given that the budget is a populist vote-on-account interim one. The idea of fiscal deficit and the creative methods use to cover up the inefficiencies. 
The final speaker for the session was Dr.Navin Kumar Jha who focused on the various expenditures rolled out by the budget and provided for a political frame that would have motivated such moves. With an emphasis on spending in the defence sector, he was critical about the allocations that have been made. Apart from these areas, several other areas like education, middle class and workers’ concern were also presented. His point gave an overview about the various aspects of the budget and the question of underfunding with relation to several programmes. He also touched upon the issues of fiscal deficit and the allocations made by the government. 
Following the speakers, the floor was open to questions where the faculty members and students presented their questions and observations. The nature of the questions were varied and focused on numerous areas and aspects. Several viewpoints and arguments were put by both the members of the panel as well the students. This exchange led to the development of a perspective to understand the interim budget. The consensus that it is in fact an interim budget and the actual implementation is still a question emerged. After an array of rather interesting question, the session moved towards its closure. The final Vote of Thanks was given by Prof. Varadurga Bhatt and the session concluded.