Who presented independent India's first-ever Budget ?

Concept

The annual financial statement of the Government of India — the Union Budget — is presented in Parliament by the Union Finance Minister. "Independent India's first Budget" therefore means the first such budget presented after 15 August 1947, which identifies the person who held the Finance portfolio in the first cabinet of free India.

Application

Independent India's first Union Budget was presented on 26 November 1947 by R.K. Shanmukham Chetty, the first Finance Minister of India. It was an interim budget covering roughly seven and a half months (15 August 1947 to 31 March 1948) and largely reviewed the economy rather than introducing major new taxes.

Contrast

• James Wilson presented British India's first-ever budget in 1860 and introduced the income tax in India — a colonial-era budget, not one of independent India.

• Jawaharlal Nehru was the first Prime Minister; he later (1958) became the first PM to present a budget, but he did not present the first budget of free India.

• Lord Mountbatten was the last Viceroy of British India and the first Governor-General of independent India — a constitutional head, not a finance minister.