Allocations for agriculture, irrigation, rural development, self-employment and health education are welcome and so is the entry of private sector in Insurance sector, it said in a statement issued here on Tuesday.

Measures on human resource development, free primary education and formation of the National Information Policy and announcements for small-scale industry are commendable. If saral, samadhan and sanman schemes could click simultaneously people will be benefited, the statement said.

The chamber, however, felt the local industry was neglected. The demand for extending SSI benefits to the texturising industry and for compound levy for process houses was not met, it said, adding the industry was burdened with reduction in MODVAT by five percent. However, the reduction of duty on nylon by five per cent was a welcome step, it added.

Gujarat Pradesh Rashtriya Janata Dal President Vishakha Kantawala said the budget had failed to take economic sanctions into consideration. The finance minister's claim that the budget will not affect the common man was misleading, she said questioning, ``Are not the hikes in petrol and postal rates not a burden?''

Telephone is no more a luxury item and insistence on every holder to file an Income Tax return was not justified, she said. The budget was directionless, she added, warning people to prepare themselves for hike in cooking gas and essential commodities.

Former SGCCI president Hirabhai Gandhi, while praising the budget, said it would boost agriculture and help farmers. Various facilities extended by NABARD for promoting self-employment and cottage industry in rural areas; quick loans and increase in infrastructural facilities all pointed to a positive budget, he stated.

Former judge of the Supreme Court of India, justice Dhirubhai Desai described the budget as ``thoroughly useless.'' Finance minister Yeshwant Sinha doesn't deserve to present the next budget, he said, pointing out that when the BJP government could take a bold step like exploding nuclear devices, the budget did not reflect any foresight. A lot was expected in the budget to be presented by a party with a different ideology. The budget should be an instrument of social change, he said.

Dr Mukul Choksi said the hike in Defence allocation was uncalled for especially when the country was not facing any immediate danger. There was no need to reduce duty on computers as users can afford to pay more, he said, observing that hike in petrol prices will lead to inflation. Having a dig at the saral, samadhan and sanman schemes, former councillor Sharad Kantawala said when the Union budget was ``neither saral nor samadhankari'' how could it be sanmanniya.''

Though former finance minister P Chidambaram had warned against introducing any scheme like the VDIS, the present government's Vivad Samadhan scheme has come as a shot in the arm to black-marketeers and tax evaders.

Vice-president of Income Tax Practitioners Association and joint secretary of All Gujarat Federation of Tax Consultant Janak Patchigar said the budget was realistic. Increase in the IT exemption ceiling from Rs 40,000 to Rs 50,000 and hike by Rs 5,000 in medi-claim was justified.

Insistence on quoting the Permanent Account Number (PAN) or GIR for transactions like buying/selling of property, car or while applying for telephone connection will bring in more people under the tax net, he felt.