With the world's worst pandemic outbreak scarring nascent economic recovery, the government may at the beginning of the unlock phase announce another stimulus package for the most hit sectors such as small business and self-employed, Bernstein said. The brokerage in a note said its macro index suggests a deterioration in economic activity during April/May. "Energy consumption has moderated, with power down over 4 per cent and oil consumption down over 16 per cent in May so far (all 2-year CAGR). "E-waybills are down 16 per cent, suggesting the impact of scale down in factory production for some product categories, owing to the shut down in retail outlets.
The Union Budget on Wednesday outlined several initiatives to drive India's technology agenda and boost digital infrastructure, including new centres of excellence for artificial intelligence, National Data Governance Policy, and Entity DigiLocker.
At present, a large number of power distribution utilities (discoms) across the country are state-owned. They are unable to ensure 24-hour 'power for all' as envisaged by the central government because they are cash strapped.
Despite finance minister's assurance, tax officials seem reluctant to take steps for tackling issues at stake
'This obsession with 'one' is not good for a country like India.'
Expressing the government's commitment to continue with reforms, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday assured India Inc that it is ready to do everything required to revive and support economic growth hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. Stressing that there is a need to promote growth as it helps bring down poverty, she however said it would not be at the cost of inflation. RBI has been mandated to keep inflation at 4 per cent, with tolerance level of 2 per cent on either side.
During the day-long visit, the Pakistani delegation will hold talks with Afghanistan's acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi and call on leadership of the interim government in Kabul and other Afghan leaders, according to Foreign Office.
Wang began a two-day trip to Pakistan on Tuesday primarily to attend a meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers of the Organisation Islamic Cooperation (OIC) as a special guest.
GST collections touched a record of Rs 1.40 lakh crore in January on rapid economic recovery, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Tuesday. In her 2022-23 Budget speech, the minister said there has been a remarkable progress made in the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime, but still a few challenges remain. "Gross GST collection in January at record Rs 1,40,986 crores; this has been possible due to rapid economic recovery," she said while presenting the Budget in the Lok Sabha. January is the seventh straight month when the GST collection has crossed the Rs 1 lakh crore mark.
She posed for the traditional 'briefcase' picture outside her office along with her team of officials before heading to meet the President. She, however, was holding a tablet instead of a briefcase to present the Budget in a digital format.
In a meeting on the sidelines of the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in Dushanbe on Thursday, the two foreign ministers exchanged views on the current situation in the region and agreed that military and diplomatic officials of both sides should meet again and discuss resolving the remaining issues at the earliest.
Terming the remarks of a Red FM radio jockey against the Gorkha community as derogatory, the govt has banned the radio channel for 7 days.The remarks about the winner of Indian Idol Prashant Tamang had triggered violent clashes in Siliguri last week.
Basil had negotiated the Indian economic relief package to help Sri Lanka tackle the current foreign exchange crisis.
7 key areas that the Budget must address to re-energise the infrastructure sector, suggests Vinayak Chatterjee.
'Three decades of intensive discussions, protocols and Confidence Building Measures were jettisoned one fine morning in 2020.' 'The primary lesson that has been learnt is that that there is no reliability about the Chinese.'
'I would want people to have food on their tables and their wages to rise.' 'Will that happen or not is the question that we need to ask and answer.'
A total of Rs 39.67 crore has been allocated to the Lokpal for the next fiscal, according to Union Budget 2021-22 presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
The definition will be revised by raising capital base to Rs 2 crore from the current limit of Rs 50 lakh.
'The BJP's real weapons are Hindutva, organisation and finance.'
As the FM said, this is a Budget that lays the foundation for the next 25 years, observes Kumar Mangalam Birla.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday said taxpayer base has almost doubled to 1.28 crore in four years of rollout of the historic tax reform and the enhanced GST mop up in the recent months should now be the "new normal". In a written message to tax officers on the fourth anniversary of GST rollout, she said implementing any reform of this scale in a large and diverse country like India can be highly challenging, but GST has brought about ease in taxpayer compliance and reduced common man's tax burden.
The former umpire's son, Rudi Koertzen Jr, confirmed the tragic news.
Sitharaman also said different departments of the government are working to provide relief to industry, which could be severely impacted by the fast-spreading virus.
India's engagement with China is "complex" and Chinese attempts to unilaterally alter the status quo along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in eastern Ladakh starting from April-May 2020 seriously disturbed the peace and tranquillity in border areas, the ministry of external affairs (MEA) said in a report on Monday.
'I'm pitching India for the strengths we offer, including the English language, engineers, doctors, nurses, professionals, innovative talent of startups.'
Kerala Finance Minister K N Balagopal has sought systemic changes in the GST structure, saying every state and consumer has lost because of its basically flawed architecture that has also led to rampant revenue leakage for the states. The Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime came into force in July 2017. Even though the framework is focused on having a one-nation-one-tax model, quite a few items, including petroleum products and liquor are still out of the GST purview.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday said India is "very close" to arriving at the specifics of the two-pillar taxation proposition at the G20 and is in the last stage of finalising the details. A total of 130 countries had in July agreed to a overhaul of global tax norms to ensure that multinationals pay taxes wherever they operate and at a minimum 15 per cent rate. The finance ministry had then said that some significant issues including share of profit allocation and scope of subject to tax rules are yet to be addressed and a 'consensus agreement' is expected by October after working out the technical details of the proposal.
It was one of the toughest times in history to announce a budget, says Harsh Goenka, chairman of RPG Enterprises.
The Congress on Monday strongly criticised the Union budget, saying Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's speech was oblivious to the declining GDP and the budget was a case of "wrong diagnosis and prescription".
In a strongly worded letter to Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Congress' Jairam Ramesh accused him of distorting facts.
India Inc is encouraged by a determined Budget.
On reforms in pipeline, she said the government is for universal right to minimum wages and wants to remove regional disparity through a national floor wage.
What some of our leaders were up to on Thursday and Thursday.
Seven of the meetings will be held in late November or early December at the finance ministry, as is the norm.
The talks took place in a beach resort in Benaulim on the sidelines of a meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation.
The Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman undertook a day long review of the Customs activities at Nhava Sheva in Raigad district off the Mumbai coast on November 25.
