Long-term capital gains tax may be scrapped and the burden of dividend distribution tax could perhaps be shifted from companies to shareholders. Also, the Budget could provide income tax relief for the salaried classes, while proposing tax sops for small, medium and micro enterprises.
India's gross tax collections soared to a record high of Rs 27.07 lakh crore in the fiscal year ended March 31, led by impressive growth in corporate tax and customs, taking the tax-to-GDP ratio to an over two-decade high of 11.7 per cent, Revenue Secretary Tarun Bajaj said on Friday.
Finance Minister P Chidambaram presented the Interim Budget for 2014-15 on Monday.
Rates may be raised from 5 per cent to 8 per cent and 12 per cent to 15 per cent. The Council can explore possibility of merger of slabs to bring down the number of slabs to three. The Central GST collection fell short of the Budget Estimate by nearly 40 per cent during the April-November period of 2019-20
Country's fiscal deficit touched Rs 516,390 crore or 95.2 per cent of the annual target during April-December, the Controller General of Accounts said.
'If because of El Nino, the monsoon is affected adversely in the current year, naturally it will affect income projections and consequently Budget numbers.'
Budget was a mild disappointment. Yet, the bull run continues.
The government has budgeted to cut the fiscal deficit to 3.3 per cent of GDP or Rs 6.24 lakh crore in 2018-19, from 3.53 per cent in the previous financial year.
Excise duties on mobile phones to be 1% without CENVAT credit or 6% with CENVAT credit. This provision will have marginal impact on telcos.
The Budget emphasises on capacity building and empowerment of marginalised sections of society including farmers.
Enthused by over 36 per cent increase in direct tax collections during 2007-08, Finance Minister P Chidambaram on Monday asked the department to aim for higher collections this fiscal than the Rs 3,65,000 crore (Rs 3,650 billion) estimated in the Budget for 2008-09.
During April-October 20 period, the tax department has made refunds to the tune of Rs 80,850 crore.
Only 80.6 per cent of the Rs 6-trillion allocation has been spent by February, data from the Controller General of Accounts shows.
It was 55.3 per cent for the same period last year, and data shows the fiscal deficit for April-May was kept in reasonable check in spite of heavy frontloading of expenditure.
Going by available indications from North Block, Mr Mukherjee may like to do a Chidambaram when he presents the Revised Estimates on February 27, 2010
'Short term volatility is likely due to various factors, global and domestic; investors may use this as an opportunity to increase the allocation to equities.'
If other states follow suit, it is going to become difficult for the GST Council to decide on the next stage of reforms.
Direct tax collections fell Rs 12,000 crore (Rs 120 billion) short of the Rs 3.87 trillion target last fiscal, largely owing to lower realisation from corporate tax payers.
Amid rising demand for coal freight and an aggressive push towards diversifying its freight basket, Indian Railways is planning to buy 100,000 more wagons over the next three fiscal years. The procurement plan will majorly comprise BOXN wagons, which are used to transport coal, said a senior Ministry of Railways official. Notably, the railways recently floated a sizeable tender worth Rs 35,000 crore of wagons, which had been in the pipeline since 2018. "Our Budget Estimates for freight increase were conservative.
In the last budget, then finance minister Arun Jaitley had allocated Rs 85,010 crore for the education sector which was later revised to Rs 83,625.86 crore.
India's fiscal deficit for the past financial year ended March totalled Rs 1,44,647 crore (Rs 1,446.47 billion), representing 99.4 per cent of the revised estimate of Rs 1,45,466 crore.
Even with the possible expenditure roll-overs and off-budget financing, the fiscal deficit target will not be met. The FRBM Act, after its amendment in 2018, allows a fiscal deficit slippage of not more than 0.5 per cent for any given year, provided there are justifications. These justifications include war, national security, severe collapse in the agriculture sector, a major natural calamity, big structural economic reforms, or the decline in real output growth of a quarter by at least 3 percentage points below its average of the previous four quarters.
The government may be staring at a modest slippage in fiscal deficit for 2022-23 (FY23), with the Ministry of Finance seeking parliamentary approval for additional spending through a second and final tranche of supplementary demands for grants. On Monday, as the Budget session of Parliament resumed, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman sought Parliament approval for additional gross spending of Rs 2.7 trillion in FY23 (which ends on March 31). While net cash outgo is pegged at Rs 1.48 trillion, the rest will be matched by savings or enhanced receipts, the finance ministry said.
In India elections are never fought in a straight line. It's fought on many issues, at many levels, with multiple emotions and with a bit of good luck, too. Sheela Bhatt reports from Rajasthan.
The July-September quarter results of software companies in the engineering research and development (ER&D) segment were broadly in line with expectations, though there have been cuts in revenue growth guidance. While results were a mixed bag, and there are cautionary views on the near-term outlook, brokerages and global consulting firms highlight the strong growth trajectory for the sector. They expect this segment of the software sector to grow by 8-12 per cent going forward.
It is time to take a few macroeconomic risks to kick start the growth.
After the RBI surprised the Centre with a record Rs 99,122 crore in surplus transfer for FY21, analysts said this will help the government tide over the revenue losses from lockdowns and extend more support to the pandemic hit industries and to the poor people. In fiscal 2020, the RBI had paid only Rs 57,128 crore in dividend to the government and the finance minister had budgeted only Rs 45,000 crore from the central bank. The higher payout followed the Bimal Jalan panel report that had set a new economic framework capital buffer for the central bank along with the contingency risk buffer at 5.5 per cent.
A cut in government spending would come at the cost of growth.
Refraining from tinkering with tax and duty rates in the interim Budget, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Monday made a huge allocation of Rs 30,100 crore (Rs 301 billion) to government's flagship rural employment programme and many other schemes in a bid to counter the economic recession.
India's fiscal deficit reached 4.11 trillion rupees ($61.67 billion) during April-October or 74 per cent of the full-year target, government data showed on Monday.
The 30-share Sensex ended up 219 points at 18,620 and the 50-share Nifty ended up 63 points at 5,472.
The main gainers on the Sensex were Bajaj Auto, TCS, Cipla, HDFC, HDFC Bank.
Finance Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday asked various ministries to try to spend more than their capital expenditure targets as well as explore public private partnerships for viable projects. During a meeting with senior government officials to discuss the infrastructure roadmap, she also urged the ministries and their CPSEs to ensure clearance of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) dues at the earliest. This was the fifth review meeting by the finance minister with ministries and departments on the infrastructure roadmap.
The challenge for the RBI in 2024 is likely to be less about containing elevated inflation and more about curbing excessive financial market exuberance and a 'problem of plenty', notes Sajjid Chinoy, Chief India Economist JP Morgan.
'We carry 6.5 billion passengers every year. We have crossed seven billion this year, and are targeting 10 billion by 2030.'
The main responsibility for producing the Budget rests with the Budget Division of the Department of Economic Affairs in the finance ministry
Measures that quickly boost demand and increase employment are needed to push up growth. Moreover, without announcing new planss, the government should strengthen schemes such as PM KISAN, MNREGA and programmes to build rural roads.
Strategic sales are tricky and were last undertaken when the Vajpayee government was in power.
The Indian Railways will earn a profit of Rs 951 crore (Rs 9.51 billion) in 2009-10, down 93 per cent from the 2007-08 level.
Providing comfort to the government on the revenue front amid fiscal stress, direct tax collection is moving closer to the revised Budget target for 2021-21 and may get a further thrust from the last instalment of the advance tax payment, the deadline for which ended on Monday. The contraction in net direct tax collection narrowed to 5 per cent year-on-year as on March 15 compared to a 9 per cent decline seen in January. In absolute terms, net collection stood at Rs 8.2 trillion against Rs 8.67 trillion in the same period last year, according to the provisional numbers shared by a government official.
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