Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s ninth Union Budget, from the lens of India’s logistics sector, reflects a determined choice of conservatism over adventurism. Unlike 2025’s headline-making Big Bang reforms, this year’s Budget, with its multi-layered interventions, is designed to reinforce the economy’s foundations.
Called as a “Yuva-Shakti driven” Budget by the FM and aligned to the long-term vision of a Viksit Bharat by 2047, the government has displayed continuity, confidence, and strategic foresight. Given the ongoing geopolitical uncertainties, and global economic volatility, this measured approach is commendable and feels rather appropriate.
For those operating at the heart of supply chains, the renewed commitment to infrastructure-led growth stands out as one of the most significant aspects of the Budget. Capital expenditure exceeding ₹12 trillion, which is about 4.4 per cent of GDP, and the highest in over a decade, underlines the government’s belief in public investment as a thriving and reliable growth engine.
The infra push
This sustained focus on creating and consolidating infrastructure provides long-term visibility and also reinforces confidence for logistics players planning capacity expansion and network optimisation.
The Budget’s emphasis on integrating growth with inclusion and a deeper global engagement is equally noteworthy. The thrust on scaling manufacturing across strategic sectors, by creating ‘Champion MSMEs,’ and sustaining record capital expenditure, sends a clear signal that infrastructure will remain the focus of India’s economic trajectory. This clarity is immeasurable for the logistics industry as it directly shapes demand patterns, investment decisions, and service innovation as well.
The infrastructure vision is further reinforced by a strong push towards multimodal connectivity and sustainability. Proposals for new dedicated freight corridors, like linking Dankuni in the East with Surat in the West, promise to not only rebalance the freight movement, but also ease congestion on existing routes. The plan to operationalise 20 new national waterways over the next five years is equally transformative for many reasons. It has the potential to unlock industrial growth while lowering logistics costs and carbon intensity which is crucial in times where climate, environment, and sustainability are critical and non-negotiable aspects. At the same time, the announcement of seven high-speed rail corridors as ‘growth connectors’ between key urban centres adds a new dimension to regional economic integration.
The combined focus on freight corridors, waterways, high-speed rail connectivity, and enhanced container manufacturing capacity is particularly impactful. Collectively, these measures will strengthen multimodal integration, reduce transit variability, and improve supply chain reliability, factors that are important enablers for export growth and deeper participation in global value chains. The exemption of customs duty on aviation parts and components, and materials to manufacture them, is another welcome step, more so for express logistics providers, and also where aircraft availability and uptime are directly linked to time-definite delivery commitments.
Champion MSMEs
While the creation of ‘Champion MSMEs’ is one of the defining features of the Budget, targeted interventions such as the ₹10,000 crore growth fund for MSMEs, liquidity support, and sector-specific incentives for textiles, electronics, biopharma, and other labour-intensive industries will further help formalise supply chains and unlock new demand across Tier-2 and Tier-3 markets.
These initiatives have tremendous potential to significantly strengthen export readiness within the sector. The removal of the ₹10 lakh value cap per export consignment is a pragmatic reform that will open access to global markets for small businesses, artisans, and startups, particularly those leveraging cross-border ecommerce platforms.
The government’s renewed focus on exports as a driver of employment, manufacturing expansion, and global value chain integration deserves recognition. At the same time, rationalisation of customs and excise duties, simplified tariff structures, and the correction of duty inversion will improve export competitiveness while simultaneously reducing friction in cross-border trade.
It is important to note that beyond the headline announcements, the Budget also addresses practical, operational challenges faced by MSMEs. Improved handling of rejected and returned consignments through technology-enabled solutions will ease compliance burdens and improve efficiency at the same time.
Focus on skill development
Equally noteworthy is the proposal to establish Training Institutes as Regional Centres of Excellence for skill development. This far-sighted move will consequently help build a future-ready workforce across the inland waterways ecosystem. Plans to develop ship repair hubs at Varanasi and Patna, alongside the launch of a Coastal Cargo Promotion Scheme, further reiterate the intent to shift freight from road and rail to more sustainable modes. The ambition to double the share of inland waterways and coastal shipping from the current 6 per cent to 12 per cent over the next 20 years is both bold and necessary.
To sum up, this Budget lays the groundwork for a robust, future-ready logistics ecosystem. By combining infrastructure momentum, empowered MSMEs, simplified trade processes, and technology-led efficiencies, it creates an enabling environment for integrated logistics providers to scale responsibly, and to play a pivotal part in crafting the next chapter of India’s growth that the world is equally eagerly looking forward to.
Disclaimer: These are personal views of the writer. They do not necessarily reflect the opinion of www.business-standard.com or the Business Standard newspaper
