U.P. has emerged as country’s growth engine: Yogi

Uttar Pradesh Vidhan Sabha on Tuesday passed the Yogi government’s ninth annual budget (2025-2026), giving nod to the Uttar Pradesh Appropriation Bill-2025 with chief minister Yogi Adityanath declaring that the state was now growing at a faster pace and that the budget would further accelerate its growth.

CM Yogi Adityanath quoted reports of the NITI Aayog and the RBI to make his point about the improvement in the Uttar Pradesh’s fiscal health. He said the financial discipline being maintained by his government was an example of good governance and Uttar Pradesh has emerged as the growth engine of India.

“UP’s GSDP rose to ₹12.75 lakh crore in 2017. This has doubled in the past 8 years and would reach ₹27.51 lakh crore in 2024-2025,” the CM said. He said Uttar Pradesh’s share in GDP has come from seventh to second place and the state was now the second highest economy in the country.

Yogi was speaking in the debate on general budget in the state legislative assembly. The CM, who listed achievements of his government using the Prayagraj Mahakumbh-2025 as an example, declared his government respected the faith of the people and so they were ‘listening to us’ and ‘will do so again in 2027 (UP assembly elections).

He said UP’s GSDP growth was 11. 6 percent against India’s GDP growth of 9.6 percent in 2023-2024. The CM said the size of the budget for 2025-2026 was 10 percent higher than the previous year’s and was presented with a theme of “Vanchit Ko Variyata” (priority to the deprived) while the opposition (Samajwadi Party) indulged in vote bank politics.

He questioned the statistics used by the leader of opposition Mata Prasad Pandey and said the state government’s revenue collection has increased from ₹2.56 lakh crore in 2016-2017 to ₹4.10 lakh crore (up to 31 January 2025) now.

He said a sum of ₹225561.49 crore has been earmarked for capital expenditure which was 20.5 percent of the annual budget.

Yogi said UP’s fiscal deficit was 2.97 percent of the GSDP which was well within the limits of the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act.

The CM said the state’s credit deposit ratio which was 46 percent in 2016-2017 went up to 61 percent in 2024.