''Even without major reforms, with a business as usual scenario, and with current inflation trends, we should be clocking around 11 to 12 per cent nominal growth.' 'That is not happening and is a source of worry,' Rathin Roy tells Arup Roychoudhury.
Economic reforms seem to be on a slow train, while good old fiscal populism is alive and flourishing.
Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana and Make in India -- are not covered here.
BJP's reversals in rural Gujarat has prompted many policy watchers to predict that the Budget would have incentives for the agriculture sector and the rural economy.
He also expressed doubts about fairness in a Central Bureau of Investigation probe into alleged corruption in the DDCA.
For next fiscal, the minority stake sale target has been kept at Rs 36,000 crore.
Arun Jaitley had a tough fiscal hill to climb.
Though the Railways is yet to declare any five-year action plan, it is clear the government is not in a position to hand-hold it for any major expansion or upgrade. The issue, however, is how far the Railways can function within the PPP format. Recent history highlights some of the challenges.
Allowing it to lapse leaves you unprotected and can, in some cases, cause loss of premiums paid, experts tell Sanjay Kumar Singh.
Listing out priorities for the Finance Ministry under Arun Jaitley and the Narendra Modi government as a whole, it said the growth rate can pick up to 6 per cent with the extent and pace of reform measures.
There is a case for analysing the fiscal deficit, separately for expenditure and investment.
The government also sought approval from Parliament for equity infusion worth Rs 2,345 crore into struggling Air India and another Rs 1,300 crore for Air India Asset Holding.
Of the seven surveys presented under Modi govt, predictions of three were quite close to the actual GDP growth rate, one saw the base year change in between, but the last three were way off the mark.
In its essence, GST is a national level system of value added taxation of goods and services, says Shankar Acharya.
GST rate cut for real-estate, income transfer scheme, farm loan waivers execution and recapitalisation of PSU banks have the potential to boost India's growth in a few months, says Neelkanth Mishra.
Govt resists pay panel suggestion on scrapping allowances for acting, bad climate, family planning, funeral, robe maintenance and even hair cutting.
It is possible that the final Budget architecture may be at variance with the comments.
Softening the demonetisation blow, the Budget for 2017-18 on Wednesday halved the tax to 5 per cent on incomes up to Rs 500,000 but proposed a new surcharge of 10 per cent on incomes between Rs 50 lakh and Rs 1 crore and raised duties on cigarettes and pan masala while stepping up allocations for infrastructure, rural, agriculture and social sectors.
21st century may have witnessed expansion of higher educational institutions, but who can afford it? Sushree Panigrahi & Jeet Singh look at the numbers.
The main reason was that CPI inflation would likely remain below 4 per cent till July.
Bharatiya Janata Party leader Sumitra Mahajan will be appointed Speaker of the 16th Lok Sabha on Friday. Other key parliamentary posts like that of Leader of Opposition, deputy Speaker, chairman of the Public Accounts Committee and head of the all-important standing committee on finance will be keenly contested.
'Is the appointment of a CDS likely to achieve the creation of battle-ready, tri-service military commands, from the current 17 single-service commands?', asks Ajai Shukla.
Significantly, about half of the CEOs who took part in the survey indicated that they propose to increase their investments in near future, 45 per cent cited no change in investment levels, while only 5 per cent expected a fall.
The Bill neither plans to make the Aadhar mandatory or limit its issuance to citizens.
'Growth is predicated on the misery of large sections of people.' 'Maybe Hindutva will be used to suppress any such unrest.'
Prime Minister Modi felt there were too many silos with no arrangement to take a comprehensive view on national security. The PM has entrusted NSA Ajit Doval to evolve a comprehensive roadmap and get it implemented, reveals Nitin Gokhale, Editor-in-Chief, Strategic News International.
The CAD in 2012-13 was at 4.7 per cent of GDP and in 2013-14 it will only 1.7 per cent, the Finance Minister said.
Rajan said it was important that the government and the RBI be vigilant to the growth scenario.
'On the tax front, most of the Budget proposals are sensible'.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's leash on foreign junkets of his ministers and bureaucrats seems to have trickled down to states as well.
Kerala has seen one of the worst floods in its history during this monsoon. From August 8 to 20, nearly 223 people have lost their lives, 33 are missing and around 1.2 million individuals from 3,02,441 families are in 3,941 relief camps. Initial losses are estimated to be around Rs 200 billion (Rs 20,000 crore). With the rescue measures in its last leg, the Kerala government is looking at raising funds to rebuild the state. In an interaction with Gireesh Babu and T E Narasimhan, Kerala Finance Minister T M Thomas Isaac says he has a three-pronged strategy to raise funds. Edited Excerpts.
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The catalyst is the run on emerging market equities, but many investors are just tired of waiting for India to get its act together.
Modi govt must implement few policy measures which it announced in Budget 2015.
All the Gujarat cadre officers have one thing in common. They do not need Modi's 'informal interactions' and advice because they are from the so-called 'Modi school of governance.' They know Modi well enough to perform their assigned roles.
The Union government is reportedly considering doing away with the practice of presenting a separate Railway Budget.
'There is tension between the zones all the time.'
Indian economy about to take-off
A sovereign bond float continued to be among the range of options to address the current account deficit (CAD), Finance Minister P Chidambaram said on Tuesday, even as former Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha asked him to tell Parliament the Centre would not countenance that measure.
A brief report card on Modi's ministers.
