Budget 2018: Emphasis on infrastructure, the highest allocation for transport sector

New Delhi: In view of the importance of infrastructure sector in the Indian economy, a significant increase has been made in the allocation for the transport infrastructure sector in the Budget 2018-19. In his budget speech, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has proposed to increase budgetary and additional budgetary expenditure of this sector from Rs 4.94 lakh crore in 2017-18 to Rs 5.97 lakh crore in 2018-19.

Apart from this, the highest allocation of Rs.134,572 crore has been allocated for the transport sector in 2018-19, while allocation of 60 crores has been allocated while promoting the infrastructure to deal with the disasters. In the urban infrastructure sector, the government has proposed to develop 10 major tourist destinations through overall infrastructure and skill development. Apart from this, 100 ideal monuments of the Archaeological Survey of India will also be upgraded.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, appreciating the work done under the Government's Smart City Mission and AMRUT, said 99 cities have been selected with smart outlay of 2.04 lakh crore under Smart City Mission. Projects worth Rs. 2,350 crores have been completed and projects worth Rs. 20,852 crores are underway. National Heritage City Development and Promotion Scheme has been carried out to rehabilitate the heritage cities. Under the AMRUT program, state level projects of Rs 77,640 crore have been approved for 500 cities.

Contract for sewer work has been awarded for 274 projects of Rs 19,428 crore for water supply contract and Rs 12,429 crore for 494 other projects. The Finance Minister said that 482 cities have started credit rating and 144 cities have received investment grade ratings. The Finance Minister announced that his Ministry would provide assistance to the India Infrastructure Finance Corporation Limited for financial funding in addition to investment in education and health sector. The objective of the recently approved Bharatmala project in the road sector is to develop about 35 thousand kilometers of highway in the first phase at a cost of Rs 5,35,000 crore.

In order to increase connectivity on the border areas, the Finance Minister announced that the government would construct tunnel under border Pass. He also announced that in order to encourage tourism and emergency medical care, the government would prepare the necessary infrastructure to promote investment in C-plane activities. In the Civil Aviation Sector, in budget 2018-19, a new initiative has been announced to control the movement of one billion in one year for a five-fold expansion in airport capacity.

Similarly, the Finance Minister has doubled the allocation for digital India program to Rs 3,073 crore. 10 thousand crore rupees have been provided in the budget for the construction and expansion of telecom infrastructure. Government has proposed to build 5 lakh Wi-Fi centres to provide broadband facility to 5 crore rural citizens.