Budget 2026: Industry Leaders Laud Defence Push, AI Incentives, and Services Growth
Budget
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CNBC TV18•01-02-2026, 23:11
Budget 2026: Industry Leaders Laud Defence Push, AI Incentives, and Services Growth
- •Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's ninth Union Budget receives strong approval from corporate leaders and policy veterans.
- •Key highlights include continuity in defense spending, a major tax incentive for data centers, and a push for India as a global hub for services, manufacturing, and innovation.
- •Bharat Forge's Baba Kalyani notes a sharp rise in defense capital expenditure, expecting large defense programs to become more vibrant, strengthening the domestic ecosystem.
- •Amitabh Kant emphasizes 22 years of tax exemption for data centers, aiming to attract global AI and cloud investments, and highlights higher defense allocations for R&D and manufacturing.
- •Salesforce's Arundhati Bhattacharya praises the cloud computing focus for accelerating digital adoption and PwC's Sanjeev Krishan points to structural reforms improving India's investment climate.
Why It Matters: Budget 2026 is seen as a continuity budget with future-facing bets on defense, AI, services, and urbanization.
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