No mention of defence outlay in Arun Jaitley’s Union Budget

Finance minister Arun Jaitley made no mention of India’s defence allocation for 2016-17 in his Union Budget speech on Monday, raising curiosity over why the country’s military spending was not revealed. The money allocated for the military’s modernisation in 2016-17 is expected to be less than what it was last year, with defence pensions gobbling up a large chunk of the budget. Strategic affairs expert Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal said: “I have been tracking the budget for more than 17 years and this is the first time there’s no word on defence allocation.” Read: Budget 2016 top takeaways: Income Tax slab unchanged; 13 cesses removed The money allocated for the military’s modernisation in 2016-17 is expected to be less than what it was last year, with defence pensions gobbling up a large chunk of the budget. Read: Budget highlights: Rs 3,000 relief for taxpayers earning below Rs 5 lakh India’s defence budget had slipped to 1.74% of its gross domestic product in 2015-16, compared to 1.78% the year before.