Budget 2015 - What's cooking? Halwa is ready

By Vijay Kumar

MORE than a hundred officers of the Finance Ministry are locked up in the cellar of the North Block from today - their mission - get the 2015 Budget printed. They will be allowed to go out only after the Finance Minister has finished reading his Budget speech in the Lok Sabha on 28th February 2015. As the FM finishes reading the budget, you can see these officers coming out like rockets - to be back in this mad mad world.

Legal Corner Icon — the image was hosted by the publisher and was not captured.Just before the lock in there is a halwa ceremony which took place yesterday.

The Halwa ceremony was attended by the Finance Minister, the MoS, Finance and Secretaries in the Finance Ministry apart from the Chairmen of the two Boards, CBEC and CBDT.

Apart from the shocks and surprises revealed and concealed in the Budget, the Budget processes involve some elaborate ceremonies apart from the halwa one. The FM is traditionally required to pose for photographs pretending to give last minute touches to his budget speech. The Budget speech itself is prepared by a large team of officers and usually the Finance Minister goes through and approves every word - he has to do it sitting in his office; even he is not supposed to take the Budget speech home to read and correct. Of course a Finance minister could give the whole speech in a flash drive to his officers.

On the Budget Day, there is another photo op outside the North Block with the Finance Minister and his budget brief case. After that, the FM takes the budget to the President of India. After appraising the President about the Budget, the FM reaches the Parliament and there is a cabinet meeting inside Parliament, where the FM explains the highlights of his budget to the cabinet ministers; after that the Prime Minister accompanies the FM to the Lok Sabha. The FM says, "I rise to present the budget ……