Budget 2026: This year, will we see January 32?

India Budget 2026-27Rumour is rife that GoI is planning to legislate January 32. Apparently, this is to avoid announcing this year's Union budget on February 1, which happens to fall on a Sunday. But there is another reason being cited in the lavatories of power, the corridors being too conspicuous for this kind of theory-mongering. It's no longer Nehru or Macaulay who's the bad guy in 2026. It's now apparently Pope Gregory XIII.

As a result, to reclaim Indic civilisational primacy, the Gregorian calendar, introduced by Gregory in 1582, is supposedly being challenged. The plan is to slowly chip it away. Or, in this case, to tamper with the last day of January by making what is now February 1 the last day - the 32nd - of the first month of the year. Opposition leaders have denounced the supposed move as 'chronological gerrymandering', announcing that they will boycott the calendrical move. But GoI fans have already started calling such resistance 'anti-Hindu' and 'anti-national', reminding critics that the pope in question was Ugo Boncopagni - 'an Italian!'

Government spokespersons have denied the rumour, but have also X-ed: 'If a European imperialist like Julius Caesar could name July after himself, why can't proud Indians add a day to January?' This ruckus should occupy the nation till well after the budget is announced - and outside any critical gaze.