Despite a bad year for the Indian economy, the wealth of India’s super rich again saw an increase this year. The top 1% of Indians hold over four times the amount of wealth held by 953 million people (95.3 crore) or the bottom 70% of the population. The total wealth of 63 billionaires is higher than the total Union budget of India for 2018-19.At the same time, every indication suggests that India’s economy is struggling. Successive finance ministers have since 2016-17 cut corporate tax intending to promote growth and create jobs. The promised up-turn has, however, not materialised. While India’s ease-of-doing-business rankings have soared and industrial, labour and environmental regulations have been weakened, growth has not picked up. Instead, as the recently released NITI Aayog Sustainable Development Goals Index shows, poverty and hunger have increased in 22 and 24 states and UTs recently. Instead of investing in addressing these issues, recent media reports suggest that a cut of Rs 2 lakh crore is anticipated in this year’s budget in the face of falling revenue receipts. Also read: A Layman’s Guide to the Union Budget: What to Look out For, Even if FM’s Speech is Silent About itThat the economy is not recovering is unsurprising. Keynesian economic theory dictates that the solution to low consumer demand, rising unemployment and a shrinking economy is enhanced public spending, especially in labor-intensive infrastructure projects. This stimulates the economy and contributes to the creation of more jobs. Lower corporate tax rates when consumer demand for production is weak gives no incentive for companies to invest in the production that could stimulate the economy. Companies are instead more likely to pocket the potential profits, fuelling increasing inequality, not economic growth. India appears to be looking towards fiscal austerity as the cure for the economy. This ignores its structural weaknesses- poor infrastructure, inadequate human capacities and the absence of a coherent industrial policy that could boost production. More needs to be done to address loopholes in the taxation system that allow tax avoidance and evasion and improve GST collections. India should learn from the example of China whose growth has been funded through investments in state-owned firms and well-targeted and long-term industrialisation efforts and conscious investment in education. Instead of investing in robust state-enterprises, India seems to be looking at disinvestment measures to shore up falling revenues. Media reports suggest that cuts in social spending are imminent. A cut of Rs 3000 crores is anticipated in school education. Ironically, this has been the year when India’s billionaires’ fortunes grew by Rs 1710 crores a day. This cut, while affecting the implementation of the government has already underfunded schemes for education and putting the implementation of the draft New Education Policy (predicated on the doubling of the education budget), amounts to two days’ gain for India’s elites. One cannot expect India to become an economic powerhouse when it has 313 million illiterate adults. Perhaps it is the very neglect of inequality in India’s fiscal policy that contributes to slowing growth. After all, as the 2015 IMF analysis of global inequality had shown, when the income share of the top 20% (the rich) increases, GDP growth declines; it increases when the income of the bottom 20% (the poor) rises.Also read: India Deserves a More Comprehensive Budget Process“The poor and the middle class matter the most for growth via a number of interrelated economic, social, and political channels,” the authors said. It is time that India’s super rich paid their fair share of taxes. India can afford higher on the super-rich such as reintroducing wealth tax, inheritance tax and a properly implemented property tax. Government can also work on dividend tax to have progressive taxation policy with increasing earning slabs from dividend.If our government is to fulfil its vision of becoming a $ 5 trillion economy and the dream of overtaking China, it needs to address the structural barriers that hold it back. India’s economy cannot continue to be structured for benefit the 1% at the expense of India’s crores of poor and marginalised. This year’s budget provides a critical test of the government’s resolve to create an economy that works for every Indian, not just the rich.Anjela Taneja is the campaign lead, Inequality, at Oxfam India.