The Constitution refers to the budget as the ‘annual financial statement’. In other words, the term ‘budget’ has nowhere been used in the Constitution. It is the popular name for the ‘annual financial statement’ that has been dealt with in Article 112 of the Constitution. The budget is a statement of the estimated receipts and expenditure of the Government of India in a financial year, which begins on 1 April and ends on 31 March of the following year. In addition to the estimates of receipts and expenditure, the budget contains certain other elements.
Overall, the budget contains the following: 1. Estimates of revenue and capital receipts; 2. Ways and means to raise the revenue; 3. Estimates of expenditure; 4. Details of the actual receipts and expenditure of the closing financial year and the reasons for any deficit or surplus in that year; and 5. Economic and financial policy of the coming year, that is, taxation proposals, prospects of revenue, spending programme and introduction of new schemes/projects.
The Government of India has two budgets, namely, the Railway Budget and the General Budget. While the former consists of the estimates of receipts and expenditures of only the Ministry of Railways, the latter consists of the estimates of receipts and expenditure of all the ministries of the Government of India (except the railways).
The Railway Budget was separated from the General Budget in 1921 on the recommendations of the Acworth Committee. The reasons or objectives of this separation are as follows: 1. To introduce flexibility in railway finance. 2. To facilitate a business approach to the railway policy. 3. To secure stability of the general revenues by providing an assured annual contribution from railway revenues. 4. To enable the railways to keep their profits for their own development (after paying a fixed annual contribution to the general revenues).
From 2017, there won’t be any separation between railway and general budget.
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