‘Blind to real crises’, ‘missed the ball’, ‘invisible ledger’: Opposition unimpressed with Union Budget 2026

Union Budget 2026: The Opposition parties were left unimpressed with Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s ninth budget. While Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, called the budget blind to real crises, Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav called it an “invisible ledger” of the ruling party, BJP’s, corruption. 

Criticising the Budget, Gandhi said, "Youth without jobs. Falling manufacturing. Investors pulling out capital. Household savings plummeting. Farmers in distress. Looming global shocks - all ignored. A Budget that refuses course correction, blind to India’s real crises," in a post on X.

Senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, echoing Gandhi, said that FM Sitharaman seems to have missed the ball. Taking to a cricket analogy, Tharoor said, the Budget had "lots of subheadings but very few specifics". "I don't know if she's been stumped yet, but she certainly seems to have missed the ball. In one or two places, she may have got edges, but I'm not quite sure that we've got anything off the meat of the bat so far,” he said, adding that there was nothing for the middle class, the lower middle class, and the states.

FM Sitharaman in the Union Budget announced that the capital expenditure target will be increased to Rs 12.2 lakh crore for the financial year 2027, up from Rs 11.2 lakh crore set for the current fiscal year, while also announcing several measures aimed at enhancing infrastructure development across the country, with a focus on tier-2 and tier-3 cities.

Reacting to the presentation, domestic equity benchmarks slid sharply, as broad-based selling across most sectors – except IT – pulled the indices lower. BSE Sensex cracked 2,370.36 points to hit an intraday low of 79,899.42 before settling 1,546.84 points lower at 80,722.94.

“The result of the BJP’s Budget is out – the stock market has crashed. We already said that the question was not whether the stock market would open on Sunday, but how much more it would fall,” said Akhilesh Yadav. He called it a ‘condemnable’ budget and said there’s ‘no hope’ from the BJP government. Yadav said the Budget will cater to only 5 per cent of the population. “The BJP's Budget is meant for its own people and commissions. It is an invisible ledger of its corruption," he alleged.

Trinamool Congress National General Secretary Abhishek Banerjee slammed the Budget for not having any mention of West Bengal, a state that’s gearing up for elections this year. "The Budget speech was 85 minutes long – 5,100 seconds – Bengal was not even mentioned. Forget Bengal; farmer, youth... there was nothing concrete for anyone,” he said. “It is the Union government and its ministers, the ones who presented the Budget, they call us Bangladeshi. Bengal was not even mentioned. Jal Jeevan Mission money has been stopped, they have not even fulfilled old promises…” he accused.

Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge said that the Modi government has run out of ideas, and that it does not provide a single solution to India's many economic, social, and political challenges. Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar also criticised the Budget for not having any mention of the state.