Gandhinagar: Presenting the annual budget for the State for financial year 2019-20, Finance Minister Nitin Patel today in his speech said, Gujarat achieved 11.2% growth rate in FY 2017-18 – a double digit growth.

Patel further said Gujarat is revenue surplus state for last 8 years continuously.

He said the State govt has not taken overdraft in last 16 years.

‘I visit Delhi in the meeting of Chief Ministers and observe that other states borrow money from Reserve Bank of India to pay salary of Government employees. Such is the situation in other states,’ Patel said.

Nitin Patel proudly said that he was presenting State budget for 7th time and the budget size this year for the first time is crossing Rs. 2 lakh crore mark.

It’s worth noting that State budget size in previous year was Rs. 1.83 lakh crore around.

Patel said this was a focused budget with emphasise on five areas: Water Management, Environment, Agriculture, Farmers’ Welfare and Employment.

DeshGujarat