This comes at a time when the COVID-19 crisis is expected to derail the government's revenue maths for 2020-21, hitting the mop-up from sources such as taxes and divestment.
Railway traffic has dropped 32 per cent to 99.86 mt between April 1 and May 14, compared to the same time last year, while its revenue, too, dipped 41 per cent to Rs 9,094.38 crore.
According to industry experts, the consumption of petroleum products in the month of April was only 30-40 per cent of what it had been prior to the lockdown. Due to this, refineries were forced to bring down their capacity too.
These conditions are implementation of the 'One Nation, One Ration Card' scheme, ease of doing business, power sector reforms, and urban local body reforms.
Later, there may be some tax relief aimed at the middle class and measures to benefit the sectors worst hit by Covid-19 and the resultant nationwide lockdown.
For many the resumption of trains is a big boon, but some say it doesn't come without confusion and worries
There could be multiple measures announced in quick succession, not only by the finance minister but also other ministers regarding their respective sectors, and by the Reserve Bank of India. The total size of these announcements could rival that of other G-20 nations as a percentage of GDP.
No change in retail prices as oil marketing firms to absorb increase
The finance minister is ready to present a second financial package. The Centre has ruled out a mega stimulus and will rely on targeted, incremental packages. Industry is clamouring for a bailout, the liquidity upheaval in capital markets is nowhere close to being sorted out, and all budgetary forecasts now stand irrelevant, reports Arup Roychoudhury.
The beneficiaries of the second set of announcements are expected to be micro, small, and medium enterprises, farmers, women, poor, migrant workers, and other marginalised sections of the society, reports Arup Roychoudhury.
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'The numbers are null and void now. Look, we can give out projections now, but we know that a week later those numbers will also be irrelevant. So we need to wait,' a top government official said.
American refiners closed some of their production, leading to futures trade benchmarked to the West Texas Intermediate going negative.
A government official said out that with hardly any economic activity, an immediate duty hike will not be productive and could be announced once the lockdown eases and demand revives.
This is because the bond market has factored in the Rs 4.88-trillion gross borrowing for April-September 2020.
The stimulus package is expected anytime this week and will be aimed at the urban and rural poor; disadvantaged sections of society; MSMEs and some of the worst-affected sectors.
It is likely the government will divide the country into different zones during the proposed extended period of lockdown and might permit a few services to function in safe zones.
The downward surprise in Q2 stemmed from a stronger-than-anticipated drag from gross fixed capital formation and marginal weakness in private final consumption expenditure. In Q3, projection errors emanated mainly from a steep unanticipated contraction in gross fixed capital formation, which was the deepest in the new series of GDP.
Even with the Rs 20,000 crore distributed among states, it will still be a fraction of what they have been demanding in financial support and clearance of pending dues.
This permission was given some time late last month, before the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on March 31 issued the indicative borrowing calendar for the states for April-June and the one for the Centre for April-September.
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