How does the Budget exercise proceed?
The Union Budget is the most eagerly awaited economic document of the government. The finance minister’s
Budget speech is only the beginning of the process of getting the Budget passed. After the speech, the
Parliament formally approves the Budget.

What timetable does the Budget exercise follow?
The rules require the Budget to be presented in Lok Sabha on a day as the President directs. To enable a
discussion on it, a time-table is drawn by the Business Advisory Committee (BAC).
Normally, the Budget is presented in Parliament in the last week of February, on the last working day.
Immediately after the Budget presentation, Parliament allots some time for a general discussion it. This is to
discuss the general thrust, policy issues and proposals made by the finance minister in his speech, to which he
replies at the end of the discussion. The reply is also general and no specifics are discussed. Also, no motion is
moved nor voting required at this stage.

What is demand for grants?
After the reply, the Lok Sabha discusses each ministry’s expenditure proposals, called demand for grants, a
process that takes several weeks and spills over to the next financial year.

What is a vote-on-account?
The demand for grants takes time, and the government cannot wait for Parliament to clear the expenditure
proposals before meeting its expenses from April 1. The Constitution, therefore, empowers the Lok Sabha to
grant a Vote-on-Account so that the government can continue with the necessary expenditure in the new fiscal,
before the Budget proposals actually get passed.

The vote-on-account normally covers the expenditure requirement of the government for two months, during
which the government is expected to continue spending proportionately on its ongoing expenditure items.

What happens if there is any unforeseen expenditure?
if an unforeseen expenditure is to be made immediately, the government can draw advances from the
Contingency Fund after making a statement in the House. Otherwise, as a rule, all new expenditure proposals
will have to be passed part of the new Appropriation Bill.

Let’s get back to the Budget timetable. What happens next?
The demands for grants presented by each ministry are taken up by the House. To examine them more
effectively, the standing committees of respective ministries study the proposals. The standing committees
hold several meetings to enable a closer scrutiny of the demands. Senior secretary-level bureaucrats make
presentations before the committee on behalf of their respective ministries. The reports of the committee are
published later.

What is the guillotine?
Parliament, unfortunately, has very limited time for scrutinising the expenditure demands. In the schedule,
there is a fixed discussion period for each ministry. Often the time allotted taken up by other pressing issues
that dominate the Budget session. So, once the prescribed period for the discussion is over, the Speaker
applies the `guillotine’, and all the outstanding demands for grants, whether discussed or not, are put to vote
at once.

What happens after the guillotine is applied?
The government formally introduces the Appropriation Bill to get authority to draw funds from the Consolidated
Fund of India. Once this Bill is passed, it becomes the Appropriation Act.
After the voting on the Appropriation Bill, the Finance Bill is taken up for consideration. Discussion on the
Finance Bill and the amendments thereto is confined to the tax proposals.
After the passing of this Bill, it enters the statute as the Finance Act. Thus the final Budget gets approved. If
voting on these bills goes against the government, it is treated as a vote of no confidence against the
government. Thus a government can even fall if a money bill gets voted out.