Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will have a tough balancing act to carry out in the 2022-23 Union Budget: accelerating growth and presenting a credible fiscal consolidation path. Sitharaman and her team of officers—led by Finance Secretary T.V. Somanathan—will need to ensure augmented spending on capital and health to insulate the economy from external factors such as Omicron and global price shocks. There's a need to gradually revert to the fiscal consolidation path of under 6 per cent of GDP.