Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present a record ninth consecutive Union Budget on February 1, 2026, which is expected to include several reform measures aimed at supporting and boosting India’s economic growth amid uncertain geopolitical conditions.
This geopolitical volatility is fueled by the Trump administration’s imposition of 50% tariffs on India last year. The US president also threatened to escalate his trade war with European allies over their opposition to the US takeover of Greenland; however, he later reversed his position.
The upcoming budget will bring Sitharaman closer to matching the record of 10 budgets presented by former prime minister Morarji Desai, though his was delivered at different times.
Which FM submitted the most budgets?
Desai presented six budgets during his first tenure as Finance Minister from 1959-1964 and another four budgets during his second term from 1967 to 1969. If Sitharaman presents one more budget after that, she would equal this long-standing record in India’s budget history.
Meanwhile, former finance ministers P Chidambaram and Pranab Mukherjee presented nine and eight budgets respectively, while different prime ministers served the country.
Sitharaman will continue to hold the unique record of presenting the highest budgets in a row – nine in a row under Prime Minister Narendra Modi. She has presented eight straight budgets so far, including an interim one in February 2024, making her the longest-serving finance minister for uninterrupted budget presentations.
She was appointed as India’s first full-time finance minister in 2019, when Prime Minister Modi won a decisive second term in office. After Modi returned to power in 2024 for a third term, Sitharaman retained his position in the finance ministry.
The longest budget speech in the history of India
Sitharaman also holds the record for the longest budget speech in Indian history. In 2020, her budget speech lasted two hours and 40 minutes. The presentation started at 11 a.m. and continued until 1:40 p.m.
She then cut her speech to two pages because she felt bad. Later the speaker completed Om Birla.
However, her speech still fell short of former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s 1991 speech in terms of word count. Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s speech as Finance Minister was 18,650 words.
The Union Budget for the financial year 2025-2026 will start on 1 February 2026 at 11:00.
