New Delhi: Following are the reactions of the top industrialists in India to the union budget 2009-10 presented by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee in parliament Monday:

K.V. Kamath, chairman, ICICI Bank: "This is a budget that will take two-three days for the larger markets, not just the capital markets, to understand and then probably react to it."

R.S. Sharma, chairman, ONGC: "I feel, overall, the budget addresses the expectations. The focus has been more on the stability and the futuristic growth, especially for the oil and gas upstream sector."

N.R. Narayana Murthy, chief mentor, Infosys: "I wish there was a roadmap to reduce the fiscal deficit from 6.8 percent to 3 percent. Second, I wish he had talked about a mechanism to enhance foreign investment. Third, I wish he had talked about the need to utilise all subsidies and the financial help he intends to give to the poor is utilised more effectively."

S. Gopalakrishnan, chief executive, Infosys: "The abolishing of fringe benefit tax (FBT) will be beneficial to the IT industry. Removing excise duty on packet software, the streamlining, and the refund of service tax on overseas services is something the IT industry will benefit from."

Som Mittal, president, Nasscom: "The decision to extend fiscal benefits available to the industry under section 10A/10B for one year will help the industry mitigate the impact of the current economic environment and help India retain its competitiveness."

S. Ramadorai, chief executive and managing director, Tata Consultancy Services: "For the IT industry, the extension of the tax exemption under STPI for one more year is a step in the right direction as is the abolition of FBT."

B. Muthuraman, managing director, Tata Steel: "I would have been happier to see a more elaborate disclosure of the government's medium-term plan including disinvestments, subsidies and controlling government's administrative expenditure. These initiatives are critical in managing the fiscal deficit and restoring fiscal discipline in government finances."

Rahul Bajaj, chairman, Bajaj Auto: "I am happy on behalf of the whole industry that FBT has been abolished, but I am a little bit unhappy about MAT (minimum alternate tax)."

Karl Slym, president and managing director, General Motors India: "The budget is encouraging due to its focus on infrastructure, education, agriculture, irrigation, health care and social security schemes."

Pranav Ansal, vice-chairman and managing director, Ansal API: "The hike in infrastructure spending will be a huge boost for the real estate industry as the two are directly related for the most part."
R. Seshasayee, managing director, Ashok Leyland: "I think we have, in a way, been victims of unrealistic expectations. What has been done is pretty reasonable. Clearly, the intention is to stick both to the larger agenda in terms of the tax reforms and the goods and services tax (GST) for 2010. I do not have much quarrel about the minimum alternate tax (MAT) going up to 15 percent."

Kalpana Morparia, chief executive, JP Morgan: "These are extraordinary times, lot of countries in the developed world are running large deficits because they got to kickstart the economy. So I think we should not be too excessively obsessed about just now at 6.8 percent (fiscal deficit)."