Did not want to spook the markets, nor any section of society with Budget 2013, says Finance Minister P. Chidambaram

He said the Budget has put any burden on people or spooked any section of market and investors.

"The main thrust of Budget is that we are following a fiscally prudent path and fiscal deficit will be contained at 5.2 per cent in current year and 4.8 per cent in the next," he said.

Asked about criticism of the Budget from allies of the UPA like SP, the Finance Minister said he was "absolutely confident that the Budget and Finance Bill will pass in Parliament."

He said government would answer all criticism that the Budget is anti-people and anti-farmers, in the Parliament. "In the past also the government got its Budgets passed," he said.

Chidambaram said the government is targeting Rs 40,000 crore from disinvestment next fiscal and another Rs 14,000 crore from sale of residual government stake in non-state firms like Balco and HZL.

Chidambaram said the current account deficit (CAD) is a tricky issue because imports were much above exports. In medium to long term, the only way to contain CAD is to increase exports as imports like oil and food cannot be eliminated.

He said the new fiscal year would be better than 2012-13 in terms of growth, inflation control and investment and cited the optimistic growth figures of over 6 per cent given by Economic Survey and Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council (PMEAC).

In 2014-15, he said the economy must have to grow beyond 7 per cent once we achieve growth of 6.1 to 6.7 per cent in 2013-14.

On inflation,

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