Why it is in the news
The Union Ministry of Finance hosted the first Conference of Finance Ministers and Finance Secretaries of States and Union Territories with Legislature, on “Financing India's Journey towards Viksit Bharat”, in New Delhi on 18–19 September 2026, led by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. It ran three working sessions — on the macroeconomic outlook, on financing agricultural transformation and on financing the energy transition — alongside discussion of GST 2.0 and the role of private capital.
The exam angle
Issue: India has adopted a debt anchor for the Union while leaving the States on a fiscal-deficit rule administered through Article 293 consent. Is an asymmetric fiscal framework compatible with a general government debt target, and what would a symmetric one look like?