New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s love for the word kartavya—duties—resurfaced in the Union Budget 2026. In an one and a half hour long speech, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman spoke this word 13 times. This is the first time the Budget has been prepared in New Delhi’s Kartavya Bhawan.
Modi inaugurated the Kartavya Bhawan in August 2025 as part of the Central Vista redevelopment project to consolidate government ministries for modern and efficient governance.
In the speech, Sitharaman said, “We are inspired by three kartavya—accelerate and sustain economic growth, full aspirations of people and aligned with the vision of Sabka Sath, Sabka Vikas.”
In the first paragraph of the Budget, Sitharaman used the word ‘kartavya’ four times, elaborating that the government will maintain the Reform Express to fulfill its kartavya.
Shift from colonial rule
This is not the first time the Modi government has used this term. The name Kartavya Bhawan was given by Modi symbolising India’s shift from colonial rule to a governance focused on duty, responsibility.
“The building was named ‘Kartavya Bhavan’ after deep contemplation, pointing out that both Kartavya Path and Kartavya Bhavan echo the core spirit of India’s democracy and its Constitution,” Modi had said.
In 2022, the Modi government renamed Delhi’s iconic Rajpath to Kartavya Path. On the occasion of Constitution Day last year, Modi laid emphasis on the primacy of duties of a citizen.
“Mahatma Gandhi always emphasised the duties of a citizen. He believed that a duty well performed creates a corresponding right and that real rights are a result of the performance of duty,” he wrote.
But the government’s detractors have a different interpretation for the new nomenclature.
“The government wants to divert attention from fundamental rights, which is why it is repeatedly emphasising duties. The government knows that if it focuses on rights, it will backfire,” PDT Achary, former secretary general of Lok Sabha, told ThePrint.
He added that to prevent the public from challenging the government, attention is being drawn to duties, and this has become the government’s policy over the years.
“The sense of citizenship is only cultivated when we connect with the nation’s mission. It’s not cultivated when we live as mere consumers in the nation, or when we feel alienated,” Rakesh Sinha, RSS ideologue and former Rajya Sabha member told ThePrint, adding that the western perspective sees citizens as a consumer.
“But the Bhartiya parampara (Indian tradition), emphasises on responsibilities. In a family, we prioritise duties over rights,” he said, adding that the Sangh parivar and the Modi government view the nation as a family.
“That’s why we are emphasising duties. This is a partnership of considering rights and duties together,” he said. He launched a scathing attack on those who claim that the government is not making people aware about rights.
“The citizens are already aware of their rights. This is an elitist approach that they think people are not aware and it is undesirable,” he added.
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Kartavya word relation with Indira Gandhi
In the second term of Narendra Modi as prime minister in 2019, he invoked the fundamental duties. In parliament, he said that there was a need for a paradigm shift in India —from the centrality of fundamental rights to the fundamental duties.
Even Modi mentioned about the duties in his article in The New York Times. ‘The true source of rights is duty, if we all discharge our duties, rights will not be far to seek’, he quoted Gandhi.
Interestingly, the fundamental duties were not part of the Constitution when it was adopted in 1950. It was introduced during the Emergency by Indira Gandhi as part of the 42nd amendment, popularly known as the Mini Constitution of India in 1976.
However, the experts wrote that authoritarian regimes know that they can profit immensely from such a paradigm shift.
“This shift allows the state to erect a mask over violations of citizen’s rights. When citizens are exclusively concerned about the performance of duties, issues of rights are relegated to the fringes of their attention,” wrote Vineet Krishna, senior associate editor for Constitutional and Civic Citizenship, Centre for Law and Policy Research, Bengaluru, in an article for ThePrint in 2019.
(Edited by Saptak Datta)