Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will be presenting the Budget on February 1.
Credit: PTI Photo
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present the Union Budget on February 1.
For the record, it is Sitharaman's record sixth Budget, with which she will tie with former Prime Minister Morarji Desai, while she is set to surpass Arjun Jaitley (who too has presented five Budgets) and will become the Finance Minister to have presented most number of Budgets from the BJP camp.
Since the country is heading for Lok Sabha elections, Sitharaman will not be presenting a full-fledged Budget for the financial year 2024-25, but instead will be presenting an interim budget or a vote on account budget.
A full financial year Budget will be presented by the government which comes to power after the 2024 Lok Saba elections. That Budget is likely to be presented sometime in June.
So that brings us to the basic question—what is a vote on account?
Vote on account explained
To put it simply, vote on account is the process where an outgoing government seeks interim permission from the Parliament to withdraw funds from the Consolidated Fund of India and spend money on expenditures and crucial government schemes for a few months until a new government is formed after the elections.
As defined by Article 116 of the Indian Constitution, vote on account is a grant in advance for the Central government to meet short-term expenditure, generally lasting for a few months till the new financial year starts.
What is Consolidated Fund of India?
Article 266 of the Indian Constitution defines the Consolidated Fund of India, which is where all the revenue of the central government, be it from taxes, funds raised by loans and interest on loans, and a portion of taxes from states, is parked. It states that no money from the Consolidated Fund may be withdrawn except under an appropriation undertaken by law, for which the Centre passes an appropriation bill during the Union Budget.