SUMMARY
The Union Budget 2023 will be presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on February 1, 2023. Before the general elections in 2024, this will be the last full Budget. Ahead of the Budget, here are some interesting facts about the previous Union Budget’s
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RK Shanmukham Chetty presented the 1st Union Budget of independent India on November 26, 1947. (Image: Wikimedia Commons)
2 / 12India's first-ever Budget was announced on April 7, 1860, in pre-independent India. James Wilson of the East India Company presented it to the British Crown. (Image: Wikipedia)
3 / 12Morarji Desai presented 10 Union Budgets, the highest by one person. (Image: Wikimedia Commons)
4 / 12In 2017 the Rail Budget was merged with the Union Budget. (Image: Shutterstock)
5 / 12Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi are the only Prime Ministers to have presented a Budget. (Image: Wikimedia Commons)
6 / 12Until 1999, the Union Budget was announced at 5 pm on the last working day of February. Former Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha changed it to 11 am. (Image: Reuters)
7 / 12The date was subsequently changed to February 1. Then Finance Minister Arun Jaitley holds his briefcase as he arrives at Parliament to present the Union Budget in New Delhi, India, on February 1, 2018. (Image: Reuters)
8 / 12The lock-in that follows the halwa ceremony' is observed to maintain secrecy around the Union Budget. (Image: Wikimedia Commons)
9 / 12Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, during his stint as Finance Minister, delivered the longest Budget speech in terms of the word count (18,650 words), in 1991. (Image: Reuters)
10 / 12Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman delivered the longest Budget speech. She spoke for two hours and 42 minutes while presenting the Union Budget 2020. (Image: Reuters)
11 / 12The Union Budget was leaked in the year 1950. Till then the Budget was printed at Rashtrapati Bhavan. After the leak, it had to be shifted to a press at the Minto Road in New Delhi. In 1980, a government press was set up in the North Block’s basement. (Image: Shutterstock)
12 / 12On 1 February 2021, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented the first paperless Budget. This was done due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic in India. (Image: PTI)
