New Delhi: Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman allocated Rs 3,23,053 crore for defence expenditure (the actual defence budget) in the union budget on Saturday.
While this is an increase of 5.81 per cent over last year, the overall share of defence expenditure in the total budget has witnessed a small decline of 34 basis points from 10.95 per cent last year to 10.61 per cent this year.
Overall, the government has allocated Rs 4,71,378 crore for the ministry of defence, an increase of 9.36 per cent over budget estimates last year. This includes the defence expenditure and civil expenditure — pensions and miscellaneous expenses — of Rs 1,48,325 crore.
Most of the hike in total allocation for the ministry has come from the increase in allocation for ‘defence pensions’ from Rs 1,12,079 crore in 2019-20 to Rs 1,33,825 crore this year.
Interestingly, during the entire budget speech of the finance minister Sitharaman, who is also the former defence minister, there was no mention of the defence budget.
The overall share of the defence budget in the total union budget has been continuously falling over the years. For instance, percentage share of the defence budget in the total budget was 11.69 per in 2014-15, which after seeing a dip to 11.24 per cent in 2015-16, surged to 12.59 per cent in 2016-17.
This further increased to 12.72 per cent in 2017-18. In the Budget Estimates for the 2018-19 budget, the defence allocation was 11.43 per cent of the total budget.
Within the defence services category, Rs 1,46,940 crore have been allocated for the India Army, Rs 22,934 crore have allocated for the Navy, and Rs 29,962 crore have been set aside for the Air Force.
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