The Bangladeshi government has clearly said it will not give access to the port unless India resolves the Teesta river issue.
Batting for the worried SEZ developers who fear withdrawal of incentives in the new direct tax code, Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma on Friday said his ministry would ensure that the sops continue.
Ministers in the Narendra Modi government have been busy making presentations on their 100 days of work. But what these presentations do not mention is that decisions by ministers have been few, with plenty of papers and files moving to the Prime Minister's Office, which is increasingly emerging as a centralised clearance point, even for routine and ordinary issues. Though policy paralysis was a term used freely for the United Progressive Alliance regime, questions are now being raised about pending decisions across ministries and whether at least some ministers have turned redundant.
The recent protests by employees of Urban Company and the case of a a Zomato delivery executive who died in a road accident point to the severely straitened condition of gig workers during the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. Budget 2021 had promised several measures to help the cause of gig economy workers, but most of them are yet to see the light of day. Even after a year, the country's gig workers continue to be without any social security cover or a minimum wage guarantee. "In Budget 2021, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman had announced that the government is looking toward including migrant and gig workers for social security benefits," says Srinivas Kotni, managing partner, Lexport, a consulting firm. Parliament had passed the Code on Wages in 2019 and Code on Industrial Relations, Social Security and Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions in 2020.
On Sunday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi expanded his Cabinet and inducted 21 new ministers. Of these, 4 - Manohar Parrikar, JP Nadda, Suresh Prabhu and Birender Singh were appointed as Cabinet ministers. Other than this, Modi has inducted 17 other ministers of state. Here's a quick look at them:
The trade deal, officials say, can lead to an effective trading bloc against the China-led Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday began his historic two-day visit to Bangladesh by paying homage to the martyrs of the 1971 War of Liberation in which India had helped.
In its letter Voda Idea has warned that it is not in a sound financial state, and added that it would be in a position to meet its liabilities only if the government initiates steps including allowing set-offs for GST credit accumulated so far, and permitting staggered mechanism for payment of balance amount of interest, penalty, and interest on penalty.
Getting an assurance from the Apple CEO on manufacturing in India will mean much to the NDA government.
Amid slowdown blues, the government has unveiled a raft of measures over the past few months aimed at improving liquidity in the system, moderating interest rates as well as credit growth apart from addressing stress in the NBFC sector.
Relax fiscal consolidation, boost public capex and reduce cost of finance, industry tells Centre
Sources in the know said the government would initiate talks with businesses, including Tatas, shortly for divesting its stake in the national carrier.
But use of that word -- privatisation -- is not encouraged. This seems to be a classic case of reforms through subtle signals, observes A K Bhattacharya.
India's GDP is within the striking distance of attaining positive growth, the Reserve Bank said observing that the letter "V" in the V-shaped recovery stands for vaccine. The Indian government launched the world's biggest vaccination drive on January 16 to protect people from COVID-19. "What will 2021 look like? The shape of the recovery will be V-shaped after all and the 'V' stands for vaccine," said an article on the 'state of economy' in the RBI's January Bulletin. India has launched the biggest vaccination drive in the world, backed by its comparative advantage of having the largest vaccine manufacturing capacity in the world and a rich experience of mass inoculation drives against polio and measles.
Industry is of the view that rising interest rates is increasing the input cost as loans are getting costlier.
The empowered committee delegation, including state finance ministers participated in two round table conferences sponsored by the Indo-Canada Chamber of Commerce and the Canada-India Business Council. Tax experts from Couzon Taylor, Brian Wurts, HST Consulting etc, made presentations at the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce event.
The BJP stalwart's body was later brought to his residence at Kailash Colony.
P Chidambaram on Saturday wondered whether the Modi government "deserves" Raghuram Rajan
Sitharaman, who was holding the Commerce portfolio (Independent charge), was on Sunday promoted to the Cabinet rank as was Goyal.
Telangana will have to wait a while before it finds a representation in the Narendra Modi cabinet.
In a meeting with the commerce minister, India Inc hammered Sharma on the collapse of investments, structural nature of the current account deficit and stagnant growth in agriculture.
In the biggest consolidation exercise in the banking space, the government on Friday announced four major mergers of public sector banks, bringing down their total number to 12 from 27 in 2017, a move aimed at making state-owned lenders global sized banks.
Experts attribute the lower target to increased allocation under the credit guarantee scheme for small businesses. Out of the Rs 3.21 trillion worth loans sanctioned under the Pradhan Mantri Mudra Yojana (PMMY) in the last financial year, Rs 3.12 trillion were disbursed to entrepreneurs, according to official data.
IT sector has lots of hope from the Union Budget 2014-15.
The high-level panel also asked the government to work towards re-orienting subsidies in a targeted manner from the crop sector to the non-crop sector and redesign the electronic National Agriculture Market.
Over 1.4 lakh jobs are estimated to be created between March 2019 and March 2021 in various central government departments, according to the Union Budget presented on Monday. The strength of government establishments was 32,71,113 as on March 1, 2019, which is estimated to increase to 34,14,226 by the first day of next month - an increase of 1,43,113, it said. The budget documents have given a break-up of the jobs estimated to be created in central government departments between 2019 and March 2021.
Rediff.com gives you a look at newbies in the Council of Ministers
To further boost bilateral economic ties with the US, Confederation of Indian Industry would organise a series of road shows, 'IndiaConnect-USA', from April 8-18.
The government had imposed Minimum Alternative Tax and Dividend Distribution Tax on SEZs in 2010-11, which were earlier exempted from almost all levies.
Samridhi Bhardwaj analyses the dynamics of duty-free liquor allowance in India.
'What stood out at these meetings between industry representatives and government leaders was how the equation between the ministers and industry had undergone a subtle and qualitative change,' points out A K Bhattacharya.
Giving a relief to exporters community, the government on Thursday said it will release Rs 56,027 crore to exporters against pending tax refunds under different incentive schemes for outbound shipments. The amount will be disbursed to more than 45,000 exporters. Briefing the media about the decision, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said that the Rs 56,027 crore, which is being released under various export promotion schemes, is over and above duty remission of Rs 12,454 crore for the Remission of Duties and Taxes on Export Products (RoDTEP) Scheme and Rs 6,946 crore for Rebate of State and Central Levies and Taxes (RoSCTL) Scheme already announced.
According to the draft, in the northeastern states the threshold is at Rs 500,000.
India is one of biggest producers and exporters of agri commodities.
The government is planning to liberalise the terms and conditions for the sale of the national carrier. The Centre is still pursuing the option of selling the airline's subsidiaries before the airline itself, in order to deal with an outstanding debt of around Rs 27,000 crore.
Daggubati Purandeswari is the only Union minister to have joined the BJP this election. 'Everybody knows Dr Manmohan Singh is a man of great integrity and I consider it an honour to have worked with him,' Purandeswari, the BJP candidate from Rajampeta, Andhra Pradesh, tells A Ganesh Nadar/Rediff.com
The commerce ministry wants the stimulus packages for exporters to continue for some more time till the sector recovers completely.
This Budget will set a direction to increase the ease of doing business and restore confidence in the economy.
'Our government has created 10 million jobs when the Indian unemployment rate is at a 45-year high.'
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