‘No one listens to the radio anymore’

Anjana Devi believes knowing the budget is men’s business.

“Marad log hi janta hai e sab, lekin woh toh nahi hain ghar par [Only men know about it but my husband is not at home],” she says. At home though, she is the one who runs the household budget. Anjana is a Chamar, a member of the Scheduled Caste community.

“Bajjat [Budget]!” she says, trying to remember if she has heard about the new announcements. “Oo sab ta hum nahi sune hain [I’ve not heard about it].” But, says this Dalit resident of Sondho Ratti village in Bihar’s Vaishali district: “E sab [budget] paisa wala log ke liye hai [It is for rich people[.”

Anjana’s husband, 80-year-old Shambhu Ram – away performing as a devotional singer when we visit – runs a radio repair workshop at their home. But customers are few. “We hardly earn 300-400 rupees a week,” she says. That’s at best an annual average of Rs.16,500. Or just 1.37 per cent of the Rs. 12 lakh tax exemption limit for individuals. She laughs when told of the enhanced limit. “Sometimes we can't earn even 100 rupees in a week. This is the age of mobile phones. No one listens to the radio anymore,” she complains.

Anjana, 75, is part of the 1.4 billion Indians whose ‘aspirations’ Prime Minister Modi believes the budget has met. But living 1,100 kilometers away from New Delhi’s corridors of power, she doesn’t share that belief.

It’s a quiet winter afternoon. People go about their daily chores, perhaps unaware of the budget. Or convinced of its irrelevance to them.

Anjana has no expectations from the budget. “Sarkar kya dega! Kamayenge to khayenge, nahi kamayenge to bhukhle rahenge [What will the government give us! We will eat only if we earn, otherwise we’ll go hungry].”

Some 90 per cent of the village’s 150 Chamar families are landless. Mainly daily wage labourers who migrate seasonally. They’ve never been in any tax bracket ever.

Anjana Devi gets five kilograms of foodgrain free monthly, but craves a regular income. “My husband is very old and can’t do work. We need some regular income from the government to survive.”