SP Leader Swami Prasad Maurya criticises Budget 2023, calls it disappointing

Lucknow (Uttar Pradesh) [India], February 1 : Samajwadi Party leader Swami Prasad Maurya has criticised the Union Budget and said that the government is an enemy of the poor while addressing a press conference on Wednesday.
Maurya said that the union budget presented by the central government is very disappointing. He claimed that the budget had nothing but tempting and false promises.
He said that the Prime Minister had promised to provide 80 crore employment opportunities for the youth, but the promise is not fulfilled he said.
He also claimed that the unemployment rate of 2.2 in the UPA government has increased to as high as eight per cent now and six crore youth are unemployed in the country.
"Women, Dalits, Backwards were also neglected in this budget," he alleged.
The Finance Minister announced that to commemorate the Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav, a one-time new small savings scheme, Mahila Samman Savings Certificate, will be made available for a two-year period up to 25 March 2025.
This will offer a deposit facility of upto Rs 2 lakh in the name of women or girls for a tenure of two years at a fixed interest rate of 7.5 per cent with a partial withdrawal option.
He said that the government did not make any provision for women's safety, but there has been a budget cut in women's protection and security.
He further said that the government abolished the scholarship given to the backward, minority and Dalit community.
"There has been an increase of 13 per cent in the incidents of Dalit harassment as compared to the previous years," he added.
"There has been a huge cut in the budget of education, health, agriculture, welfare, and urea subsidy," said the Samajwadi Party Leader said.
Speaking on MNREGA, he claimed that the budget of MNREGA has been cut by 33 per cent. "This government is the enemy of the poor," he added.
He called the promise to provide homes to be a political gimmick. He said that the promise to provide housing to all by 2022 turned out to be a hoax.
"Maybe it (the BJP) can stage a drama of providing housing in the 2024 election year," he alleged.
The outlay for Prime Minister Awas Yojana (PMAY) has been enhanced by 66 per cent to over Rs 79,000 crores, announced Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman while presenting the Union Budget 2023-24 in Parliament on Wednesday.
This is a significant increase considering Sitharaman, in the Budget 2022-23, had proposed an allocation of Rs 48,000 crore for the Housing for All initiative of the government.
The government, last year, had promised that 80 lakh houses will be completed for the identified eligible rural and urban beneficiaries of PMAY.
Swami Prasad Maurya also claimed that there are 30 Lakhs vacant posts in various departments in the Government of India, yet the government did not do anything to provide employment to the youth.