As per the recent NEWS published in First Post, the new finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present her maiden Budget on 5 July. A day before she presents the Union Budget, 0n 4th of July, the Economic Survey 2019 will be tabled in both the Houses of the Parliament.
What is Economic Survey ?
The Economic Survey is an annual document that reviews the developments in the economy over the previous 12 months. The document summarises the performance on major development programmes, highlights the policy initiatives of the government and analyses the prospects of the economy in the short to medium-term. Every year, the Economic Survey is tabled in the Parliament a day before the Union Budget.
The flagship document is prepared by the Department of Economic Affairs, which comes under the Finance Ministry, and released under the guidance of the Chief Economic Advisor (CEA). This year CEA Krishnamurthy Subramanian is leading the process of preparing of Survey document.
Importance of Economic Survey
The Economic Survey serves as a useful policy document since it also contains policy ideas, key statistics on economic parameters and in-depth research on macro and sectoral trends. Often, the survey serves as a policy guideline for the Union Budget. However, its recommendations are not binding on the government. More often than not, the policy recommendations presented in the document have not made their way into the Budget proposals.
The Economic Survey is an important official document used widely by students, researchers and teachers alike for studying the trends in the Indian economy and contains a wealth of useful data.
Till some years ago, it used to be published by the government and was available in the market two to three days after the presentation in the Parliament.However, since the last few years, it is being published by Oxford University Press (OUP) and becomes available in the market almost one month after its presentation in Parliament by the finance minister.
