Budget 2024: The Interim Union Budget for 2024 is scheduled to be presented on February 1. It will be the sixth time Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present the budget. From the time of Independence till now, finance ministers have had a lot of records against their name for one or other reasons. Interestingly, Nirmala Sitharaman holds the record for the longest budget speech.

While presenting Union Budget 2020 on February 1, Sitharaman spoke for two hours and 42 minutes, starting his presentation at 11 am and continuing till 1:40 pm.

In 1991, Manmohan Singh delivered a budget speech that consisted of 18,650 words, which is the record for the most spoken words in a budget speech.

In 1977, Finance Minister Hirubhai Mullajibhai Patel gave the shortest Budget speech, which contained only 800 words.

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Other Records related to the budget

India's first budget was presented on 7 April 1860 by Scottish economist James Wilson of the East India Company. It introduced income tax, which is an important source of revenue today.

After India's independence, the first budget was presented on 26 November 1947 by the then Finance Minister RK Shanmukham Chetty.

Former Prime Minister Moraraji Desai presented the highest number of budget proposals, presenting 10 budgets during his tenure as Finance Minister.

Till 1955, the Union Budget was presented only in English, but the Congress government decided to publish it in both Hindi and English.

During the Covid period, the 2021-22 budget was completely digital, a first for independent India.

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