At a time when social media has remained more about trolling and war of words, Mahindra & Mahindra head Anand Mahindra is probably one of the few people who are immensely adored by internet users, more specifically Twitter users. Anand Mahindra is known for his epic tweets which are a combination of his sense of humour, learnings, kind gestures and a peek into his lifestyle.
If one has followed him enough, he could know Anand Mahindra is also a fan of cricket, like most Indians. One can see Mahindra tweeting often about cricket matches. Recently, he took his love for cricket to another level, drawing an analogy from the sport to share his views on the Union Budget 2020, which was announced by finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday.
Using cricket metaphor, Anand Mahindra, speaking about the sharp fall in the stock market post budget, said that it was possible to do more in the ‘Super Overs', implying that the market would recover in the coming week as "no wickets have been lost".
"Continuing with the cricket metaphor, it’s still possible to do all this & more in the ‘Super overs.’ We’ve just shown we’re good at that! Post-budget policy reforms must continue...And markets should start recovering tomorrow. Because no wickets have been lost!" he tweeted.
The market had fallen sharply after the budget announcements on Saturday as investors were disappointed over no mention of the LTCG tax and hike in customs duties of many products.
He further tweeted, "But the approach called for now was to hit early boundaries and get the crowd cheering & raise their ‘josh.’ So What may have worked better would have been a speech focusing on 3-5 big ideas to kickstart consumption in employment-multiplier areas."
Sharing his views on the 2019 budget, Mahindra had said he wished finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman had hit a few boundaries in her budget.
The Mahindra group chairman criticised Sitharaman for not hitting "some boundaries", but praised her for "steady singles and keep the run-rate moving."
Before the Budget presentation, Mahindra had wished Sitharaman good luck, with a hope that she would "hit many boundaries in the parliament ‘stadium’."
Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented the Union Budget 2020 in the Parliament on Saturday with the key announcements being the new tax slabs, proposal to raise banks' deposit insurance, LIC IPO launch, among others.
In terms of fund allocation to key sectors, agriculture and rural development have been given Rs 2.83 lakh crore, Rs 1.7 lakh has been allocated for the development of transport infrastructure, Rs 99,300 has been announced for education and Rs 60,000 crore has been allocated for healthcare.
Among the things that got costlier are cigarettes, tobacco products, medical equipment and others due to hike in taxes while select alcoholic beverages are among the items that got cheaper.
First Published: Feb 4, 2020 2:14 PM IST
