How the Budget is made: From tallying numbers to meeting farmers and industrialists, from weighing public sentiments to charming investors, mandarins and politicos mix brainstorming and secret hurdles to bring you the annual event. How the Budget is made

With finance ministers and bureaucrats in the North Block refusing to give special status to the country's financial capital, Mumbai hasn't got much from the Union Budget in the last five years.

Congress chief Sonia Gandhi has asked the government to include nearly 25 million families who qualify as "poorest among India's poor" - and covered under existing food handouts - in the National Food Security Bill. Zia Haq reports.

Finance minister P Chidambaram's intent to walk the talk on fiscal discipline and nurse the government's delicate balance sheet back into health appears to have run into stiff resistance from ministerial colleagues. Chetan Chauhan reports.