March equals spring equals freshness equals liveliness equals inventory equals time to get your affairs in order. A tall order, but March does have a way of putting back the A in activity and the Z in zeal, and gives us a brief window of opportunity to clean up our respective acts and get our affairs in order. That's why housewives dust and mop and sweep and clean with the mad frenzy of worker bees, school children run all the way to school and back, adolescents hum and sing endlessly out of key, and the more matured among us take five weekly baths instead of none.

That's also why we have budget sessions and tax deadlines, which usually means long queues in front of heartless clerks. In legislation, it means more shouting from the right wing, and less concessions for the left. Spring, is as usual, entirely without a dull moment.

The budget is actually the name for a small leather bag. Papers containing financial estimates and statements were brought to the English House of Commons in a budget, but soon, like all things English, the name applied to the papers themselves. It is just as well the English preferred the French bougette over the Indian jhola, or the North American backpack. Jholawallah and backpacker are terms usually associated with a sense of financial irresponsibility.

'Budget', on the other hand, symbolizes the embodiment of all things politically and fashionably correct. Trust the French to set a trend for everything, the English to translate it into a law, and the Indian to dutifully copy all of the above.

Manipur, on the other hand, has not copied or emulated anything that can be termed politically or financially correct. Except for the capacity for first aid. It has turned that rueful old slogan of "Make do and mend" into a way of life. All over the state, its few machines of production grind on with misshapen wheels and bent nails and veering shafts and flapping belts when they ought to have gone to rest years ago.

Take for instance, the all-weather, all-terrain warhorse commonly referred to as the Shaktiman - which looks like it could fall apart at any shaky moment, but still manages to climb the unclimbable and carry three times its own weight. Or even the omnipresent rice mill - which shudders and complains and groans to keep turning, but still manages to separate husk from grain in less than half the time it would normally take to get the job done by hand. There may be little grand design about everyday life in Manipur, but the ability to hang on by the fingernails is indeed prodigious.

In all of these and many more, you have to question the relevance of the annual budget in today's state of affairs. Multiple demands, corruption, stagnation across all sectors, and the increasing volatility of the overall Indian economy, are making a mockery of traditional financial planning techniques. Few can predict what funds will be required from one quarter to the next, let alone accurately forecast spending plans twelve months ahead.

There is arguably no budgetary spending regime of any value being operated inside the state government today. Budgets remain only to provide a semblance of financial control to otherwise jittery stakeholders such as independent entrepreneurs, contractors, heads of department, and heads of ministries. They work because they encourage the assumption that if a Government budgets, then it has devised some kind of rock steady Grand Financial Plan based on deep thinking and in-depth analysis of past, present and planned expenditure. Who wouldn't trust such a Government with their investment or multi-million rupee order?

The reality is that the vast majority of budgets might as well be set by children clutching their pocket money and heading for the nearest sweet shop. This is not to malign governments - far from it. It is to say that budgets are meaningless even as they are set because, quite simply, events happen, and in this day and age, they happen in real-time and their impact is cross-sector and cross-border.

There is no expenditure plan devisable that can account for the entire multiple and diverse events that could impact departmental and state budgets months ahead. This is because the sector worlds - and economies today - are entwined across the state and nation, and no government can stand aside from the domino effect of national or local events.

The fact is that if you use budgets to control expenditure they only constrain, but if you use them to encourage revenue generation then they actively create innovation, which is how economies grow. Like it or not, governments can no longer justify the time, money and effort they invest in the budgeting process. To meet financial needs today, state spending has to become much more responsive, supporting real-time tracking and departmental empowerment.

The state has put a great deal of hope and faith in the "community interest" kind of approach: village councils, self-help groups, and cooperatives. It is a matter of great sadness that the method has seldom showed much return. What should have been established is that any kind of group effort which is intended to increase income and output will succeed only if it is directed and managed by professionals, who set the pace, pot the snags, provide the training, and establish the market. They have to in fact, run a business, and not assist in a club.

You would have to be comatose not to be aware of the budget battles raging all over the state, at all levels of government, institutions, districts, universities, charitable organizations, etc. Can you imagine any of these saying we will tailor our activities to match our income, or we will not go into debt, or we won't pay up demands, and not having a fight on their hands from one interest group or another?

If a person can reconstruct history and is willing to do it, that record will greatly aid in establishing a current budget. But if history cannot reasonably be reconstructed, then the best thing to do is start now.

In truth, budgeting is a boring guilt-ridden subject for lots of people, and I am shameless in looking for some kind of hook. A budget is part of reviewing where we are financially, and helping us stay on the proper financial path. We have the basic common sense to be frugal, avoid debt and spend wisely. If we do, we will enjoy financial happiness in the future, and maybe end up even where we want us to be - the gateway to the East, or something close to it. At least. It's really up to all of us. It's the least we can do.