Infrastructure
In the past decade, Sitharaman stated that govt has undertaken several initiatives for large scale enhancement of public infrastructure.
She announced a committed and continued focus to develop infrastructure in cities with over 5 Lakh population that is, tier II and tier III, also calling them growth centres.
She noted that Public Capital Expenditure has increased from 2 lakh crore in 2014-15 to 11.2 lakh crore in 2025-26. In the FY 2026-27, FM proposes to increase it to 12.2 lakh crores.
Alongside, she also proposes to set up an infrastructure risk guarantee fund so as to provide partial credit guarantee to lenders.
Moreover, FM proposed to establish new dedicated freight corridors connecting Dankuni in the East to Surat in the West. She also announced a proposal to operationalise 20 new waterways over next five years starting with National Waterways 5 in Odisha.
A ship-repair ecosystem catering to inland waterways will be set up in Varanasi and Patna.
There will be a launch of coastal cargo promotion scheme for incentivising model shift from rail to road, so as to increase the share of inland waterways and coastal shipping from 6% to 12% by 2047.