Sustained Growth as A Key ‘Kartavya’

Over the past decade, the government’s policy actions have enabled the economy to combine stability with sustained growth of around 7%, moderate inflation and a steady path of fiscal consolidation. Nonetheless, even amid the ‘Goldilocks’ phase that India is currently enjoying, the risks emanating from weakening multilateralism, fragmented trade, disrupted supply chains and accelerating technological change loom large.

In this context, the Finance Minister, presenting her ninth consecutive Union Budget, a first in India’s history, is to be commended for presenting a Budget that balances short-term requirements with long-term objectives, or as the Economic Survey aptly puts it, running a marathon as sprint.

Particularly noteworthy was the framing of the government’s economic agenda as kartavya, signalling a shift in perspective towards governance as a statement of duty. This article focuses on the first kartavya, namely accelerating and sustaining economic growth by enhancing productivity and competitiveness while building resilience to volatile global dynamics.

Towards this objective, the Finance Minister announced interventions across six key areas: scaling up manufacturing in seven strategic and frontier sectors; rejuvenating legacy industrial sectors; creating champion MSMEs; delivering a strong push to infrastructure; ensuring long-term energy security and stability; and developing City Economic Regions.

Manufacturing remains central to India’s growth strategy given its role in large-scale employment generation, export competitiveness, supply chain resilience and Atmanirbharta.

The expansion of the India Semiconductor Mission into ISM 2.0 marks a decisive deepening of India’s manufacturing strategy.

Textiles and sports goods manufacturing also receive focused attention, reflecting their employment intensity and export potential. Modernised clusters, technology upgradation and integration with global value chains are expected to help these sectors move up the value ladder while supporting large-scale job creation. Targeted interventions are proposed for biopharma through Biopharma SHAKTI, aimed at positioning India as a global hub for biologics and biosimilars; chemicals and capital goods are similarly supported through cluster-led and scale-oriented interventions.

The CII has consistently advocated enhanced capital support to address the resource constraints faced by MSMEs. The budget acknowledges these challenges and proposes a comprehensive set of measures such as the creation of Champion MSMEs, which is backed by a concrete financial architecture, including a ₹10,000 crore SME Growth Fund and a significant overhaul of MSME liquidity mechanisms through TReDS.

Taken together, the first kartavya articulated in the Union Budget 2026–27 represents a coherent and well-calibrated growth strategy.

Note: This article was first published in THE HINDU