Proliferation of home chargers of around 7 KWh and above, which take six to seven hours to fully charge a car depending on the model, bring running costs down by a third or so. That, coupled with the increasing range of modern electric cars, can lead to a massive increase in sales.
A decision to this effect has been taken after Arun Ramanathan retired as finance secretary on Thursday. Currently, Chawla is the senior-most official in the finance ministry. In addition, G C Chaturvedi, currently serving as additional secretary in the ministry of health and family welfare, has been appointed as additional secretary in-charge of the financial services department.
'The dakiyas will be our partners, receiving credit proposals from micro-enterprises at the grassroots level.'
It was a protest which held a mirror to the government of a state taking pride in its commitment to democracy, gender equality and social indices.One person, who in his employed days had known governments and political parties at close quarters, told me that public perception of how the Kerala government handled the ASHA workers' strike had been terrible, reports Shyam G Menon.
The highest-ever goods and services tax (GST) evasion has been done by the online money gaming industry.
Lok Sabha passed the Finance Bill, after approving more than two dozen official amendments, by voice vote, thus completing the Budgetary exercise for 2019-20 in the Lower House.
The Budget should use the extra RBI surplus to better effect, suggests A K Bhattacharya.
The FM said an announcement with regard to the additional steps will be made after consulting Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman spelled out water, its management, clean rivers as one of the 10 points of vision for the next decade.
Arvind Mayaram, who was shunted from Finance Ministry to Tourism only a fortnight ago, has now been transferred as secretary in minority affairs ministry even before he took charge of his new post.
Of the total proposed allocation, over Rs 1 lakh crore is meant for BSNL and MTNL-related expenses, including Rs 82,916 crore infusion in BSNL for technology upgradation and restructuring at BSNL.
Indian and global airlines such as SpiceJet, Emirates, Virgin Atlantic among others too are marketing Covid-19 insurance products to attract passengers.
Nationalist Congress Party leader and Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Saturday didn't join his cabinet colleagues Devendra Fadnavis and Chief Minister Eknath Shinde in visiting the Nagpur-based memorial of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh founder.
In mid-March this year, the finance ministry asked state-run banks to review their gold loan portfolio for the two-year period between January 1, 2022, and January 31, 2024. This business had grown at a fast clip. Reserve Bank of India (RBI) data has it that it grew 15 per cent to Rs 1 trillion in FY24. Now, in recent times, any kind of exuberance in financial services has seen the authorities swoop down - be it pushing the lines on governance or unsecured credit.
From highways connecting once-remote regions to aviation networks carrying millions, India's infrastructure story is one of transformation.
Pre-Budget excercise next month should scrupulously avoid adventurism of all types and refrain from making excessively ambitious projections on revenue and expenditure numbers for 2023-24, suggests A K Bhattacharya.
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.
The finance ministry is considering amending the Banking Companies (Acquisition and Transfer of Undertakings) Act, 1970, which governs public-sector banks (PSBs), to make suitable provisions for allowing PSBs to transfer shares to the Investor Education and Protection Fund (IEPF) when dividends of such shares remain unclaimed by the investors for seven consecutive years. "While Section 10B of the Banking Companies (Acquisition and Transfer of Undertakings) Act, 1970, allows the transfer of unclaimed dividends to the IEPF, it, however, does not mention a provision for transferring unclaimed shares and may now be amended by the next government to allow such transfers to happen," said a person familiar with the matter.
Irani's deputy in the I&B ministry Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore has been given the charge of the key portfolio.
To offer additional support at the low end of the income ranges, the Centre will consider a large-scale jump in exemption rates under the old income-tax regime in the vote on account, or interim Budget, according to a senior official in the know. Those will include an extension of the income tax exemption rates close to Rs 7 lakh and additional measures for women farmers.
Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday assumed charge as the Finance and Corporate Affairs Minister for the second consecutive term and is slated to soon present the final Budget for FY '25 that is going to set the tone for the Modi 3.0 government's priorities and direction for Viksit Bharat. Upon her reaching the North Block office, Sitharaman was greeted by Finance Secretary T V Somanathan and other top officials. Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary was also present. Chaudhary assumed charge on Tuesday evening.
The L-G will take decisions on police, officers of all-India services such as the IAS and the IPS, and giving sanction for prosecution in various cases.
Budget has already bombed at the box office and passing it without a revisit will be a mockery of the exercise though any modification may be short lived and perfunctory, observes V Ranganathan.
But the government will present a second tranche of Supplementary Demands for Grants during the Budget session of Parliament in February, when it can seek additional spending.
IOA president P T Usha on Sunday slammed the revolting executive council members, saying they 'seem more focused on self-serving power play and monetary gain'
Concerned over the fallout of the Red Sea crisis and severe shortage of containers against the backdrop of a steep decline in merchandise exports in August, the Union government is pulling out all the stops to find a solution. To begin with, the government has devised a strategy aimed at boosting container supply and supporting exporters.
The generation of quality jobs and skill development should be the focal point, cutting across ministries and departments, asserts Nivedita Mookerji.
The finance minister's assertion that industry should not expect any spectacular announcements in the 2024 interim Budget suggest that the electoral imperatives of more tax concessions or higher expenditure on welfarist programmes could be far less pronounced than they were before the 2019 interim Budget, expects A K Bhattacharya.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Sunday concluded a crucial visit to Male, assuring the country's top leadership that the Maldives remains an important partner of India in maintaining peace, stability and prosperity in the Indian Ocean region.
With the fiscal deficit target staring at the government, the FY25 Budget has limited expenditure options, points out A K Bhattacharya.
Good monsoon is likely to create more jobs in the agriculture sector, which in turn could save the exchequer around Rs 10,000 crore
Unlike the previous visit, where TDP MPs accompanied Naidu to meetings, sources termed the current visit as "low profile", with one-on-one meetings with key Union ministers.
The Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) is considering raising the monthly minimum wage ceiling from Rs 15,000 now to improve the coverage and bring millions of informal workers under its purview. The last increase in the minimum wage ceiling was in 2014 to Rs 15,000 from Rs 6,500.
Everybody talks of China as the real threat, but we aren't even building a decisive capability against Pakistan, asserts Shekhar Gupta.
India will also launch a sovereign gold bond to lower physical demand.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will set a record by presenting the sixth Budget in a row -- 5 annual Budgets and one interim -- a feat achieved so far only by former Prime Minister Morarji Desai. With the presentation of interim Budget on February 1, Sitharaman will surpass the records of her predecessors like Manmohan Singh, Arun Jaitley, P Chidambaram, and Yashwant Sinha, who had presented five budgets in a row. Desai, as Finance Minister, had presented five annual Budgets and one interim Budget between 1959-1964. The interim Budget 2024-25 to be presented by Sitharaman on February 1, will be a vote-on-account that will give the government authority to spend certain sums of money till a new government comes to office after the April-May general elections.
Pant, a 1991-batch Indian Administrative Service officer of Rajasthan cadre, is currently secretary in the ministry of ports, shipping and waterways.
On the first day of the new financial year, there was a sense of dj vu in the power sector. As has been the case for the last many years, the capacity addition during the year, of 9,263 Mw, is a little over half the target of about 17,000 Mw.
External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee was on Friday given the additional charge of Finance Ministry with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh being admitted to the hospital for a heart bypass surgery on Saturday.
P Chidambaram was on Tuesday made the finance minister as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh undertook a minor reshuffle in portfolios in the Union Cabinet, necessitated by the exit of Pranab Mukherjee in June. According to the announcement, Power Minister Sushilkumar Shinde is the new home minister in place of Chidambaram.
