December 15, 2025
Sougata Ray’s speech on the Supplementary Demands for Grants – First Batch for 2025-26
I rise to speak on the Supplementary Demands for Grants. I resent the fact that the Finance Minister is not here. The Minister of State is there, and he has become the President of BJP, Uttar Pradesh. What will he look into finance? Sir, this demand is for additional Rs. 41,000 crore budget outgo, but actually the total Supplementary Demand is Rs. 1.32 lakh crore. Out of this, Rs. 90,000 crore is technical because this amount will be made up from savings of different departments, and Rs. 41,000 crore roughly will be outgo from the Government. Out of this Rs. 41,000 crore, Rs.18,000 crore is for fertilizers. Out of that, Rs. 11,000 crore is for fertilizer subsidies, and Rs. 7,000 crore is for import of urea. Similarly, Rs. 9,500 crore is meant for the Petroleum Ministry. Out of that, the oil companies will be made up for their loss as far as LPG is concerned. Unfortunately, this country produces only 33 per cent of its petroleum requirement, so you can understand the situation. Now, I would say that the Finance Minister has tried to do a reasonable job in the sense that only 4.4 per cent is the fiscal deficit target, which we shall be able to meet this year. Even though the Finance Minister does not have a finance background, yet she has worked hard. I must say that. But, there are severe fault lines in the Supplementary Demands. What are the fault lines? Fertilizers like urea are in crisis. The farmers are lining up every day from morning to get urea. Now, urea is being sold in black market. The Government is doing nothing about that. Our production will be hit because of lack of urea.The second thing I want to mention is that oil marketing companies want to be fully compensated for their loss in supplying LPG. We may be in for another LPG price rise. I would urge the Government that let them give more
money but do not increase the price of LPG. I am saying that there are some fault lines in this whole budget. Another issue is related to Vodafone. The Government is considering relief for this financially stretched company. I would like to know whether the Government will actually give the answer on this. Sir, you are a studious man. You must have noticed. Five months ago, Modi’s friend Trump said: “India is a decaying economy, a finished economy.” This is what Trump said. I want to know what the Central Government says. Sir, the IMF has said that India is in ‘C’ category. IMF retained its ‘C’ grade for India’s national account statistics or GDP data. They are saying that GDP growth is there, but IMF is saying that this is in ‘C’ grade in statistics. The Government will have to reply on this.…Sir, everybody will congratulate you for your election, but you listen to me.… Sir, the other point I want to say, and where we are terrible, is the rise in the fall of rupee. The rupee became Rs. 89.46 against the dollar from Rs. 89.12.
Our currency has fallen against all other major currencies, more against the euro and also against the dollar. We are in a very bad situation. All imports including petroleum imports will cost more. This is a very bad situation. We have to reply to President Trump that we are not a dead economy. He said on record that India is a dead economy and that is why we are not in a hurry to have a trade pact with India. The IMF has put our country in ‘C’ Grade category. We should be very concerned about all this. Sir, we were discussing education a little while ago. India’s rank in the Human Development Index released by UNDP is 130. We are the 130th country in the Human Development Index. This index measures countries in terms of health, education and other matters. What explanation does the Government offer regarding this? I do not want to speak for a long time since Shrmati Pratima Mondal will also speak on behalf of our party. Sir, I want to pose one question. Why is the Finance Minister depriving West Bengal in the matter of MGNREGA? This year the MGNREGA dues to West Bengal s Rs. 7,000 crore. It is Rs. 52,000 crore for the last two years and total dues of West Bengal is Rs. 2 lakh crore. Why is West Bengal being deprived? Do you think, we shall be kept down forever? We have already protested. We shall continue to protest. There are some people who are inimical to West Bengal like Sukanta Majumdar. They do not want West Bengal to get money. But, in spite of everything, we shall give poor people their sustenance and we shall win the elections in 2026. Sir, supplementary demand is an essential part of the budget making exercise. We know that if the Government has shortfall, it has to be made up. We know that there is also technical savings in the sense that they will be made from savings of other Departments. In this way, another technical supplementary expenditure is Rs. 8,337 crore, which is sought for transfer to monetisation of National Highways, to fund Infrastructure Investment Trust (InvIT), and Rs. 35,950 crore is sought for investment under conversion of outstanding spectrum auction dues into equity in respect of Vodafone Idea Limited. So, all is not well in the state of Denmark. Even though the Government says that our economy will be the third economy in the world. It will be a five trillion-dollar economy. The economy has serious fault lines. I hope that the Finance Minister, who insulted this House by not coming to the House in the time of debate, will reply to all these questions whenever she comes here.
