Govt forgot farmers, senior citizens in Budget: Sena MP

Mumbai: Shiv Sena MP Arvind Sawant on Wednesday said though the government has provided relief to the salaried class, it has completely forgotten the farmers, youths and senior citizens, and also took a dim view of the decision to give infrastructure status to affordable housing sector.

"While the Budget has given relief to salary earners, it completely forgot farmers, youth, senior citizens and women with no substantial provisions for them," Sawant told PTI.

Even as Finance Minister Arun Jaitley announced that the skill training sector will continue to remain high on priority, with rural areas set to getting more attention, Sawant said this sector has "failed miserably" in the present government's tenure.

Questioning Jaitley's assertion that affordable housing will get infrastructure status, Sawant asked the government should reveal how many affordable houses have been created till now.

"There are announcements on the housing sector for the poor. But how many houses have actually been created in the last 2.5 years? In many places houses have been created but people are yet to get possession. At many places, it is also seen that the area of house grossly differs from the area promised," he said.

Sawant further said that making budgetary allocations for construction of toilets will do no good unless problems of water are sorted out.

"Even today I see men, women and children defecating in the open. Places where there are toilets, nobody can use them because there is no water. How will constructing new toilets help unless problem of water is sorted out," he asked.

On the Railway Budget, Sawant said, "We are yet to understand what has been announced in the budget."