Vol. 2 · pages 31–35

12 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES Now, coming to the budget itself, I do not propose to go into the details of the different items of which this budget is composed. That would take me too long; nor do I think the general discussion is the occasion on which one should go into the details of the expenditure. I propose to confine myself to the general aspects of the budget, the broad problems with which we are faced and the ways and means adopted by the Finance Minister to deal with those problems. The first thing to note is that the new items which have been added in this budget to the frame-work of the administration as it exists now, come up to a total sum of Rs. 1,16,67,000. The question is, does this show a real expansion of our activities ? Now, Sir, I think we must make one deduction from this figure, and that is the deduction of Rs. 48,11,000. That part of the expenditure, as admitted by the Finance Minister, is non-recurring, that is to say, it is intended to cover temporary items which are the needs of the day. They are not intended to provide permanently for such deficiencies of the social services which it is the duty of the Government to make good. Therefore, deducting Rs. 48 lakhs out of a total of Rs. 1,16,00,000 you get a balance of Rs. 68,56,000 and therefore, I say that correctly estimated what the Government has come forward with’ as a permanent addition of expenditure for meeting the social services of this Province is not what is alleged to be this big sum of Rs. 1,16,00,000 but the sum of Rs, 68,56,000. From that you have also to make a further deduction in my judgment, and that further deduction is Rs. 31,45,000 due to prohibition. That is merely a negative thing. It adds nothing positively to meeting the needs of the Province. It is merely the foregoing of an amount of revenue which was due to Government. Therefore, ultimately what one finds as the real budget providing for permanent expenditure is nothing more than Rs. 37,11,000. How this amount of Rs. 37,11,000 is distributed by the Government, many members of this House know. One conspicuous item is education, which takes up 29 lakhs ; that is recurring. Minor irrigation is Rs. 3,50,000, which is also recurring. The rest is nonrecurring; and the other items of expenditure are village panchayats, village open sites, water supply, medical relief, quinine, teaching of Ayurvedic medicine, and all that; they are all non-recurring; that is to say, they are merely intended as stopgaps for the year. Now, Sir, taking the budget in the way in which I submit, it ought to be taken, the question really that has to be asked is this ; is this Government to be congratulated when, as a matter of fact, it comes before this House and demands nothing more than this paltry sum of Rs. 37,11,000 ? Sir, I have no hesitation in asking, having regard to the needs of this Province, having regard to the illiteracy, having regard to the poor health, having regard to malaria, having regard to gonorrhoea and syphilis and the other diseases that are prevalent in this Province, whether it connotes a sense of responsibility, whether it connotes a sense of adequacy on the part of this Government to come forward with nothing more than a paltry budget of Rs. 37,11,000. I see my honourable friend the Minister is laughing. Of course he must laugh. What else can he

13ON BUDGET do ? He can do nothing else (Laughter.) (An Honourable Member : Should he cry ?) I wish he did cry, and I would very much like to see him cry, because that would really show a certain amount of feeling and a certain amount of sympathy. A laugh carries us nowhere and is certainly not an argument. Now, Sir, let me take another aspect of the question; it is this. Is there any chance of this expenditure provided for by the Government in this budget becoming permanent ? Is there any chance of the Rs. 29 lakhs which the Government proposes to spend on education being available for the next year or the year after that ? Is there any chance that the provision made by the Government for minor irrigation works and for many other things—is there any hope for us to feel that money for spending on all these items will be available to us next year or the year after ? Can we depend upon it that these will be permanent items ? Sir, I cannot give a positive answer. But it will be clear to all of us if we really ask one question, and it is this ; how is this expenditure financed by the Government ? What are the means adopted by it for the purpose ? I find that the Finance Minister, in making up his budget, has, in the first instance, depended upon a surplus of Rs. 10,50,000 from the current year’s budget. Then he has drawn upon this year’s balances to the extent of 63 lakhs; and thirdly, he hopes to have, by what he calls the additional yield from certain taxes which are levied now, a sum of Rs. 8 lakhs. These are the sources on which my honourable friend is depending for financing the new items which he has provided in the budget. But, Sir, the question that I ask is this : are these sources, these ways and means which have been devised by my honourable friend the Finance Minister permanent and lasting ? Can they be depended upon to return from year to year ? Let us analyse the figures. First of all, the increase in the current year’s revenue which has given him Rs. 10,50,000 is principally due to the fact that by good luck he has been able to get additional income from two sources, namely, excise and stamps. According to his own figures, these two sources of revenue have given him Rs. 21,52,000. Then, the Government of India gave him as part of income-tax return a revenue of 27 lakhs. Now, on his own principle, prohibition, or rather the excise revenue, is tainted money. His whole show, if one may say so, is a tainted show, based on tainted money. Let us not talk about the past; we are faced with the present; and there is no question about it that this excise money will not come to him again. Not only is he not collecting more but he is giving up what he has. Stamps, I do not think, will yield him much. He does not expect much from that, and, therefore, so far as recurring years are concerned, these two items which swelled his balance must now be dismissed from our consideration. Income-tax may or may not come. That again is a contingent item. Therefore, all that one can see now, so far as the future is concerned, is this. For the new items of expenditure which he has shown in the Budget, the basis in the form of real assets is nothing else but the paltry sum of

14 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES 8 lakhs of rupees which he proposes to derive from remodelling the system of tabacco taxation which prevails in this Province. For this additional expenditure of 37 lakhs of rupees, all the revenue we have is 8 lakhs of rupees on which we can depend. Therefore, I feel I am justified in saying even this petty show which has been presented to us in the form of a budget of 37 lakhs may not come again next year. Now, Sir, let us look at this Budget from another point of view. I ask this question : What are the liabilities, responsibilities, which the Congress Government propose to take upon its shoulders ? Let us realise what our total liabilities are. Sir, it is a small matter whether these liabilities are such that we can meet them tomorrow, day after, or whether it will take a long time for us to meet these liabilities. That is altogether a different question. It is quite important; I say quite essential and in fact fundamental, that all of us—those who are sitting on this side and those who are sitting on the other—should know once for all what we propose to undertake with respect to the welfare of the people of this Province, so far as the welfare of the people of this Province is concerned. Therefore, it is very necessary that we should take stock of what the ultimate position is going to be apart from the question how we meet and how soon we shall meet it. Now, Sir, it is quite clear that, traditionally taking things as they stand in this Province up to this day, Governments have undertaken, although they have never fulfilled, their responsibilities and duties which certainly cover such fields as education, public health, medical relief, and one may say, to a certain extent water supply. These are admittedly the functions of Government. Now, I am glad to say that the Congress Ministry, when it came in office on the 17th August 1937, issued a statement which is called a statement on the “ Labour Policy of the Government.” I would like to remind my honourable friend of that statement, because he has altogether taken no note of what Government have stated in the Press Communique. Referring to that statement, I find that Government have unequivocally accepted the fact that these are not the only duties which this Government would look upon as their obligations. The Congress Government have accepted that over and above these, what are called the essential services— education, public health, medical relief, and water supply—there are, by common standards now prevailing in all modern countries, other duties which Government must undertake. These duties, I find, are unemployment benefit, sickness insurance, old-age pensions, maternity benefits and premature death benefits to dependents. Therefore, we have got to start with this position that my Government who claims to have the reins of office in its hands must look upon these duties as part of their functions. And the question, therefore, is what are going to be the total liabilities of Government, if Government were to decide upon discharging these obligations ? As I said, it matters nothing, it does not solve the problem, whether we are in a position to do this today or not. It is quite essential, quite necessary, that we ought to know what our duties are and what is the

15ON BUDGET liability in which we will be involved ultimately. Now, Sir, taking all these things into consideration, I would like, I would welcome, even at the closing of the debate, some kind of estimate from my honourable friend from his expert hand, to tell us what exactly would be the liability thrown on the revenues of this Province, if we are to undertake the discharge of those liabilities in their fullness. I have made some little calculation so far as I am able to do. My calculations cannot be exact. I have no information, I have no data, I have no expert assistance, but I have ventured to make some kind of estimate to find out exactly what would be the total financial liabilities of Government. Modestly speaking, the total liabilities of this Province will come to 24 crores of rupees. This is what a Government of this Province will have to bear in mind. I have no objection which Government comes in. Even this Government may perpetually carry on the administration of this Province. I have no quarrel so long as that Government is conscious of what their obligations are. The question, therefore, we have to bear in mind is, how are you going to raise this sum of 24 crores ? It may be a little more or a little less ; somewhere about that figure will be the liability of the Government in this Province to undertake. Sir, I ask : Is it within the competence of this Government, any Government for that matter, to raise this sum ? Let us now turn to certain figures of revenue in other parts of the world and let us compare the position in other parts of the world with the position that we find in our own province. I have worked out some figures of per capita revenue in some countries. They are— £ s. d. Canada . . . . . . 9 8 0 South Australia . . . . . . 19 0 0 New South Wales . . . . . . 13 0 0 New Zealand . . . . . . 22 0 0 Union of South Africa . . . 4 0 0 (This does not include the revenue collected by the Provincial Governments.) Australia . . . . . . 12 0 0 Irish Free State . . . . . . 10 0 0 Bombay . . . . . . 0 0 7 Sir, this, I say, is a most staggering picture. It is a picture, it is a contrast, which is bound to make any Finance Minister who wants to take the responsibility of bringing welfare to the mass of the people of this province, shake in his shoes. Now, the other thing which we have to notice with regard to the financial position in this province is that our revenues have been absolutely stagnant. I am quoting the Finance Minister himself. In the last year’s budget speech, he gave us a very useful set of figures comparing the increase of revenue

16 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES in the different provinces of India between 1922 and 1935. The increases were : — Per cent. Madras . . . . . . . . . 26.7 The Punjab . . . . . . . . . 28.6 The United Provinces . . . . . . 16.7 Assam . . . . . . . . . 14.7 Bengal . . . . . . . . . 11.9 Bombay . . . . . . . . . 3 Even this 3 per cent has to be taken with a further deduction. This increase is found to be on the basis that you take into consideration all the additional taxation that was imposed from the year 1922. If you deduct all the additional taxes that were levied from 1922 to 1935, the revenues of the presidency of Bombay have decreased by 5½ per cent. We, therefore, find ourselves in this position, that our revenues are not increasing at all ; they are practically in a stagnant position. Now, add to that two new factors. The first is that this position is now going to be worse off by the prohibition policy which has been adopted by this Government. Secondly, we have to bear in mind that this Government has announced its policy of reducing the land revenue. Now, it is a fact that these two items of revenue together make up something like 7 crores of rupees. These 7 crores of rupees, having regard to the policy laid down by the Government, must now be regarded as the vanishing assets of the province. Therefore, the net revenue which you can calculate as a permanent basis for building up anything that could be permanent is only 5 crores of rupees. As against this, you have to set up, as I said, an ultimate liability of 24 crores of rupees. Now, Sir, the question is : What are the ways of improving the financial resources of this province ? I am very sorry to say, but I must really say it, that looking at the financial statement and the budget speech which my honourable friend made, that this budget is a most retrograde budget. It is a budget which shows that the Government has gone back on its plighted word. Sir, the last budget speech which the Honourable, the Finance Minister made, I do say—and I think praise must be given where it is due—did contain an element of boldness, an element of radicalism, which gladdened the hearts of those of us who were sitting on this side of the House. I have compared the speech which he delivered on the last occasion, with the speech which he delivered the other day, and I noticed a very painful contrast between the two. Sir, last year ; my honourable friend—at any rate judging from the speech which he delivered—gave me the impression that he was conscious of one of the most difficult and one of the most important problems with which we are all faced, namely, the problem of finding money. He was not only aware of the fact that, that was our one supreme problem, but he gave us the promise that he would tackle it in such a way that not only would there be greater resources available for the benefit