Only when this happens, is the primary market likely to be revived. There is yet another area on which Mr Sinha pins his hopes. He has tried to encourage the investments into infrastructure. The growth in infrastructure not only makes economic production more cost-competitive, but it itself generates strong income linkages. In fact, when Keynes said that the government should arbitrarily invest irrespective of what that investment would earn, he in fact meant the public utilities.
Infrastructure has some fantastic implications for employment and associated investments.
The only problem is that it is not connected with the immediate returns on the funds locked in. The promise of user charge or of tax holiday is too thin a ground for investing into infrastructure by the private sector. And, in the present budget, there is very little ground for us to expect any dramatic increase in the government outlay on infrastructure projects. If the corporate hopes for a rejuvenation of the economy are to materialise, then it is imperative that the private sector takes up a major role in infrastructure building of the country . Mr Sinha's budget resembles Mr Manmohan Singh's budget of 1992.