In a veiled attack on Congress, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman connected her idea of carrying Budget documents wrapped in a red cloth instead of a briefcase with alleged corruption in the previous UPA government at the Centre. Speaking at the International Business Conference of Nagarathar, she said: “For Budget 2019, I did not carry a suitcase. We are not a suitcase-carrying government. A suitcase also denotes something else: suitcase-taking, suitcase-giving. Modiji’s government is not a suitcase government.” For the presentation Union Budget for 2019-20, Sitharaman decided to go with the swadeshi ‘bahi khata’ in line with Indian traditions, instead of the Budget briefcase which she said belonged to the British colonial era. She flashed the ‘bahi khata,’ which is a kind of a ledger, wrapped in a red cloth containing her Budget speech and other related papers outside the North Block. The picture went viral on social media.
