New Delhi: As the annual ritual of India’s fiscal planning approaches, attention is quietly turning to an unusual possibility: the Union Budget for 2026 may be presented on a Sunday. If long-standing parliamentary convention is followed, February 1 will once again be Budget Day — and in 2026, that date happens to fall on a weekend.
Despite the Budget Session of Parliament yet to be formally announced, preparations within the government appear to be moving ahead on the assumption that the Finance Minister will rise to present the country’s accounts on that day.
For Nirmala Sitharaman, the occasion would carry more than routine significance. The 2026 exercise would mark her eighth consecutive Union Budget.
A Sunday presentation would not be without precedent, even if it remains uncommon. In recent years, budgets have been delivered on Saturdays when February 1 coincided with the weekend. The decision to advance the Budget date to February 1, introduced in 2017, was itself a significant procedural shift. The intent was practical: to ensure that Parliament could complete the budgetary process before the end of March, allowing ministries to begin spending seamlessly from the first day of the new financial year on April 1.
Before this change, the Budget was traditionally presented toward the end of February, often necessitating a Vote on Account to keep government expenditure running until the full financial proposals were approved. Advancing the date removed that interim step and compressed the legislative timetable, giving lawmakers more time for scrutiny and implementation.
Date Institutionalized
Government sources suggest that the February 1 date has now become institutionalized, reducing the likelihood of last-minute adjustments even if it falls on a non-working day. Historically, Parliament has not shied away from meeting on Sundays when circumstances demanded it. Special sittings have taken place to mark national milestones and, more recently, during the Covid-19 pandemic, underscoring the flexibility built into parliamentary practice.
Still, no official confirmation has been issued. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju has indicated that the final call will be taken by the Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs at an appropriate time. Until then, the possibility of a Sunday Budget remains just that — a possibility, albeit a strong one.
If the schedule holds, the 2026 Budget would add another first to Sitharaman’s tenure. It would bring her closer to the benchmark set by Morarji Desai, who presented ten budgets across two stints, and place her ahead of several other prominent finance ministers in terms of continuity.
More than the statistics, however, the moment would underline how tradition, reform, and circumstance continue to intersect in the choreography of India’s most important financial statement — even if that choreography unfolds on a Sunday morning in Parliament.