Lok Sabha Speaker to preside over all-party pre-budget meet - India News and Travel Times Provides India-centric and other News and Features

Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar will meet leaders of all political parties to finalise the agenda for the Budget session beginning Monday. The Speaker would like to get a sense of what issues likely to be raised during the session. Meanwhile, the Congress Core Committee finalised its strategy for the session at a meeting of senior party leaders on Friday. Bharatiya Janata Party had earlier said that it would raise the issue of price rise, internal security and India-Pakistan talks in today's meeting. The Left has said that they will raise the issue of food inflation and other issues concerning the common man. Parliament begins with an address by the President Pratibha Devisingh Patil to a joint sitting of both Houses on Monday. The Railway Budget will be presented on February 24, while the General Budget would be presented on February 26. India 's inflation hit a one-year high in December 2009, fuelled by almost 20 percent jump in food prices, due to weak monsoon rains and flooding in parts of the country.