Budget 2017: Printing of document begins with 'Halwa' ceremony

New Delhi: As the Union Budget 2017 gets closer by the day, the printing of the documents began Thursday in the presence of Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.

The ritual ceremony was held at 4 pm along with other Finance Ministry officials at the North Block here.

A light moment from the Halwa ceremony today, that marks the beginning of printing of #Budget2017 documents pic.twitter.com/ndHdcXBBHA

— PIB India (@PIB_India) January 19, 2017

More than 100 Finance Ministry officials will stay in Budget Printing Press till Jaitley presents his budget speech. As part of the ritual, which has continued for long, `halwa` is prepared in a big `kadhai` and served to the entire staff in the ministry.

This year`s Budget, which will be the third full-fledged Budget of the present NDA government, is scheduled to be unveiled in Parliament on February 1.

The `lock-in` of the documents is followed by the `halwa ceremony`, which is observed to maintain the secrecy of the budget preparation process.

With Agency Inputs