Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday allocated Rs 1 lakh crore towards technological research while presenting the Interim Budget 2024 in Parliament, calling innovation "the foundation of development."
"A corpus of ₹1 lakh crore will be established with 50-year interest free loan provided. The corpus will provide long-term financing or re-financing with long tenors and low or nil interest rates. This will encourage the private sector to scale up research and innovation significantly in sunrise domains," Sitharaman said in her presentation.
She invoked the words of former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri, who coined the iconic slogan "Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan," which was later expanded by former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee with inclusion of "Jai Vigyaan," and even further by Prime Minister Narendra Modi with "Jai Anusandhan."
In her address, Sitharaman highlighted that the central government disbursed Rs 34 lakh crore to people through direct benefit transfer to PM Jan Dhan accounts, resulting in savings of Rs 2.75 lakh crore by eliminating leakages.
The Finance Minister informed the Parliament that the Skill India Mission successfully trained 14 million youths and reskilled or upskilled an additional 5.4 million.
She also highlighted the integration of 1,361 'mandis' into the electronic National Agriculture Market (eNAM), benefitting 18 million farmers. The eNAM platform facilitated transactions totaling Rs 3 lakh crore, she said.
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