While it could not match up to the farm sector in terms of sheer allocations, the social sector remained one of the priority areas of the Union Budget.Finance Minister announced speedy implementation of recommendations of the Sachar Committee, continuation of schemes for scholarships, modernisation of madrasa education and implementation of the Prime Minister’s 15-point programme for minorities, the Budget announced Rs 3,780 crore worth of multi-sectoral development plan for 90 identified minority concentrated districts in the country. It also made a provision of Rs 540 crore for the plan for the next financial year. Districts with substantial SC/ST populations also found the attention of the UPA Government with the Budget announcing establishment of an additional Navodaya Vidyalaya in each of the 20 districts that have a large concentration of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes with a funding of Rs 130 crore.For people below poverty line (BPL), the Budget announced a substantial hike in the subsidy component provided by the Government for construction of houses under the Indira Awas Yojana (IAY) from Rs 25,000 to Rs 35,000 in plain areas and from Rs 27,500 to Rs 38,500 in hill/difficult areas. It also announced to raise the subsidy for upgradation of houses from Rs 12,500 per unit to Rs 15,000. PSU banks have been asked to include IAY houses under the differential rate of interest (DRI) scheme for lending up to Rs 20,000 per unit at an interest rate of 4 per cent to provide additional credit to rural BPL families for construction of houses. The scheme is likely to benefit over 20 lakh rural households during 2008-09.Given the UPA Government’s commitment towards aam aadmi and the concomitant Unorganised Sector Workers’ Social Security Bill, 2007 pending before Parliament, the Budget announced its own tranche of financial contribution to both the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY) and the Aam Aadmi Bima Yojana (AABY).The RSBY will provide a health cover of Rs 30,000 for every worker in the unorganised sector falling under the BPL category. It will start from April this year in three states Haryana, Delhi and Rajasthan. For this purpose, the Budget announced to provide Rs 205 crore as the Central share of the premium.For AABY, which provides life insurance to rural landless poor, Chidambaram announced that the scheme would cover one crore eligible families by September this year and also announced to provide Rs 1,000 crore to LIC to cover another one crore eligible households during this year.
