KATHMANDU: Nepali Congress (NC) leader Dr Minendra Rijal has accused the government of presenting a budget crafted to deceive people in the hope of winning the election. He added the government had come up with new slogans to deceive the people.

Rijal, also the Finance Minister of shadow government formed by NC, said, “The budget is big and all allocations, expect in social security allowance and infrastructure, have been raised by 2-3 percent.”

Rijal added, “The government aimed to spend 30 percent more than this year’s budget. That is not possible.” Moreover, Rijal does not see it viable to meet estimated expenditure and revenue collection.

“Revenue collection is also expected to increase by 25 percent, which is also not possible,” he said.

While presenting the budget for the current fiscal year, Rijal had told preceding Finance Minister Yuba Raj Khatiwada his forecast that the national economy would shrink by 2%. “It did. Khatiwada did not believe us then,” Rijal said.