Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman along with her ministers of state Bhagwat Karad and Pankaj Chaudhary, other senior finance ministry officials and members of budget press held the customary ‘halwa’ ceremony at North Block. The minister also distributed the halwa to all those present at the ceremony.

The Halwa ceremony marks the ‘lock-in’ stage of the budget preparations.

Sitharaman will present the last full budget before the country goes to polls next year on February 1.

This Budget will be paperless much like the last two budgets. The Budget documents will be available in English and Hindi on the “Union Budget Mobile App” available on both the Android and Apple OS platforms after the Finance Minister finishes her Budget Speech.

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