Not only is there a possibility for a conventional retaliation by Pakistan, there could also be terror attacks.
State governments in Punjab, Gujarat, Maharashtra and Jammu & Kashmir are on high alert and have come up with contingency plans to ensure the security of residents in case of a war.
The decision to scrap the plan for landless workers and focus only on small and marginal farmers was made as there was no proper method to find out who qualify as landless labourers.
The combined fertiliser, food and petroleum subsidy budgeted estimate for FY19 is Rs 2.64 trillion, while the revised estimate is Rs 2.66 trillion. If the carrying forward to FY20 does not happen, the revised estimates for the major subsidies could actually cross Rs 3 trillion for the first time ever.
Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has graduated from being a stalwart of the CPM to a 'strong' mass leader and arguably the 'most able administrator' that the state has seen in over three decades, reports Shine Jacob.
Fifty-six months on, the government's record in implementing these schemes and projects has been mixed, report Arup Roychoudhury and Indivjal Dhasmana.
General Budget is a terminology earlier used to differentiate between the Union Budget with the Railway Budget. Full-fledged budgets are titled "Union Budget", while interim Budgets are titled just that.
The finance minister is likely to announce the government's vision for a tax-friendly regime by raising the I-T exemption limit from the current Rs 250,000 per annum.
Goyal is expected to discuss the targets for the banks for 2019-20, as well as priority sector lending, recovery on non-performing assets, and the bankruptcy proceedings of various companies, which owe money to the banks.
'The target for next year is unlikely to be more than that of this year. The more you divest in any cycle, the less your potential pipeline for the next,' said an official. 'The first two issues we want to tackle and complete in FY20 are Air India and Hotel Ashok.'
Jaitley also hinted that these very economic realities could decide whether the government sticks to a fiscal consolidation roadmap or not.
The government was planning to come up with a new fiscal model giving 'special incentives' for fields that were given out on nomination to ONGC and Oil India, reports Shine Jacob.
The 66-year-old finance minister underwent a successful kidney transplant surgery in mid-May and was on leave since April due to kidney-related problems and chest infection.
This amount will include Rs 13,100 crore that Economic Affairs Secretary Subhash Garg has been publicly seeking from the central bank's contingency reserve fund since 2017-18 (FY18).
The losses in state elections in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Chhattisgarh have put the ruling party under pressure to announce swift measures aimed at addressing rural distress and lack of employment.
The Centre is likely to cut budgetary support to the railways by around Rs 5,000-10,000 crore for 2018-19, out of the total budgeted GBS of Rs 53,060 crore. Due to this cut in GBS, the railways is likely to depend more on borrowings, asset monetisation, and internal generation to meet the capex target of Rs 1.465 trillion for the current year.
The Centre has projected reining in its fiscal deficit at 3.3 per cent of GDP in FY19.
A chunk of divestment till now has come from follow-on offerings in the Centre's two ETFs, Bharat-22 and CPSE. Now, there will be initial public offerings of Mazagon Docks, rail companies RVNL and IRFC and MSTC.
CARE Ratings, in a report, said it foresees an increase in the retail prices of petrol and diesel in the coming few days, depending on how the oil markets react in the reduction in supply from the cartel.
Highly-placed sources in the government say that none of the senior ministers had any inkling of Patel's resignation