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'I would rate this Budget 5 out of 10'

Last updated on: July 7, 2009 
'I would rate this Budget 5 out of 10'

We had a lot of hopes from this Budget because we have an excellent team at the Centre led Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh," says Siddharth Kuvavala, a stock market investor and real estate consultant.

He thinks that India managed to alleviate the pain of a global slowdown and sustained its growth tempo only because she had a great team that managed India's finances at the Centre.

However, the failure of Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee's Budget in slashing securities transaction tax, the status quo when it came to short-term capital gains tax, no substantial increase in exemption level for calculating personal income tax and no complete tax exemption on interest income earned by senior citizens was a huge letdown.

"I would rate this Budget at 5 on a scale of 1 to 10," he says.