FM Nirmala Sitharaman to Lead Halwa Ceremony as Budget Printing Begins
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will be officiating the customary halwa ceremony at North Block, Delhi, today at 5 pm, marking the beginning of the printing process of the Union Budget 2025-26. This marks the final stage of annual rituals ahead of presenting the union budget in Parliament on February 1.
The ceremony will encompass the whole team involved in budgeting, namely finance secretaries, top officials, and members of a dedicated printing press. Sitharaman, making her eighth straight Budget speech, will be flanked by several first-timers who are secretaries of the six departments under the Ministry of Finance. The new entrants in the Budget team include M Nagaraju as Financial Services Secretary, Manoj Govil as Expenditure Secretary, and Arunish Chawla as DIPAM Secretary and Secretary of Public Enterprises. On the other hand, for Tuhin Kanta Pandey, Finance Secretary and Revenue Secretary, and Ajay Seth, Economic Affairs Secretary, this would be their last cycle of Budgeting before retiring mid-2025.
The halwa ceremony also initiates the lock-in process for officials and staff directly involved in preparing and printing the Budget. Once the ceremony is over, these individuals are not allowed to leave the premises of the Finance Ministry, away from their families, until the Budget is presented. This is to ensure complete secrecy during the final stages of the process. North Block has a printing press exclusively used for Budget documents, which ensures greater confidentiality.
The Union Budget was traditionally presented at 5 pm on the last working day of February. Until 1999, the timing of the Budget remained the same; however, since then, it has been moved to 11 am. In 2017, the government pushed the date of the Budget presentation to February 1 to provide better implementation of fiscal policies.
The practice of printing the Budget at Rashtrapati Bhavan was withdrawn in 1950 following a leak and moved to a press at Minto Road. As of 1980, the Finance Ministry even established its own printing press at North Block. Officials are kept inside for lesser duration now and also fewer copies of the Budget are printed now. This transition was hastened by the Covid-19 pandemic, which forced the government to release the 2021-22 Budget documents only in digital format, while providing e-versions to Members of Parliament.
The Budget papers include more than a dozen sets of documents, and on the presentation day, they are transported in secured vehicles to Parliament. Copies are distributed to MPs and sent to various ministries and departments.
The halwa ceremony is a blend of tradition and symbolism, an opportunity to acknowledge the tireless efforts of those behind the scenes. As the nation awaits the upcoming Budget, it reflects not just fiscal priorities but also the meticulous coordination and dedication that go into its preparation.
