The Union government is reportedly considering doing away with the practice of presenting a separate Railway Budget.
Investors should view the increase in the LTCG tax rate in conjunction with the increase in capital gains exemption from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 1.25 lakh, which will provide some relief.
Due to paucity of time, the UPA government will drop the traditional scrutiny of the Budget by the Parliamentary standing committees. Instead, Pranab Mukherjee is in touch with BJP and the CPM, while Pawan Kumar Bansal and Anand Sharma have been asked to liaise with the smaller parties to ensure the Budget moves smoothly through Parliament.
The people of the nation co-operated and patiently waited for the government's promised "ache din", and now they want their just rewards, says Adhil Shetty.
The Kerala unit of the Congress instantly gets a headache when Shashi Tharoor lets loose one of his observations showering flowers on enemy territory. With every such action triggering controversy within a nervous Congress party, some feel it is high time Tharoor showed a degree of solidarity with the ideals of his party, notes Shyam G Menon.
While no specific state-oriented sops were rolled out, a strong thread of political wellness ran through the Budget.
The National Pension System (NPS) added 21.5 per cent fewer fresh subscribers under the corporate segment in 2023 compared to the preceding year. Government officials and experts attribute it to the higher exemption limit of income tax of Rs 7 lakh announced in the FY24 Budget that no more requires employees under this income bracket to opt for NPS for tax-saving purposes. Data collated from the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) reveals that the corporate component is voluntary in nature and saw 158,212 new subscribers in 2023 compared to 201,517 during 2022.
The session will begin with the address of the President to the joint sitting of the two Houses on Friday morning followed by the presentation of the Union Budget on February 1.
India is considering allowing new private sector banks, including by industrial houses, and a roadmap for the same could be announced in the annual Union Budget to be presented later this month.
They have been on an unbroken selling streak since the Union Budget, spooked by increase in income-tax surcharge, taxes on buybacks, and lack of stimulus to prop up the economy.
The Budget still remains a very important event for India.
Budget for 2022-2023 has returned to its agenda for protectionism in the name of creating a self-reliant India, points out A K Bhattacharya.
Among those who submitted their respective ministry's suggestions was Minister of Urban Development S Jaipal Reddy who called on the finance minister in New Delhi on Tuesday.
This year's tally is the second best ever after 2022 when 16 firms raised Rs 40,311 crore, led by LIC's biggest-ever IPO.
Equity benchmarks Sensex and Nifty ended on a mixed note on Wednesday as the euphoria about the Budget fizzled out, with investors going for profit-taking ahead of the Fed interest rate decision. The 30-share BSE benchmark Sensex climbed 158.18 points or 0.27 per cent to settle at 59,708.08 after it trimmed most of the intra-day gains. During the day, it had zoomed 1,223.54 points or 2 per cent to 60,773.44.
Modi launched the membership drive of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party from his Lok Sabha constituency of Varanasi on Saturday, noting that it will further connect people from all walks of life with the saffron party.
With Google announcing the milestone of Willow - a state-of-the-art quantum computing chip that can solve complex problems in under five minutes, a computation so complex it would have taken a supercomputer around 10 septillion (10^25) years to complete - tech experts believe this breakthrough could impact artificial intelligence (AI), particularly by making it more accessible to the masses. However, industry players caution that it may take several years for this innovation to become commercially viable.
There is a lot of optimism as regards the defence, railway and manufacturing sectors.
While the finance minister had a great opportunity to come out with flying colours while presenting this last Budget of his government, he didn't, says Omkar Goswami.
'When it is unpaid, sometimes, they don't take you seriously.' 'Work is not reviewed, and there is no effort in making interns learn.'
Under the title of "legal enforcement", states and Union Territories were directed to appoint officers solely responsible for discharging the functions of Child Marriage Prohibition Officers at the district level.
'The Budget needs to focus more on social welfare schemes.'
Securing the GDP estimates a month in advance would be a challenge and the government should take the Central Statistics Office on board before embarking on the new schedule for Budget presentation
Tuesday's meeting at the PM's residence, attended by all the five secretaries in the finance ministry besides top officials of other economic ministries and NITI Aayog, cleared a five-year vision plan for the government to make India a $5-trillion economy by 2024.
Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee presented the Union Budget 2010-11 in parliament on Friday. A look into the hihghlights.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present her second Budget a little more than a month from now. Like any other FM, Sitharaman will depend on her team of bureaucrats and advisors to frame and present the Budget.
RSS-aligned Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS) on Monday expressed disappointment over the government's budget proposals with regard to divestment and foreign direct investment, especially in the insurance sector. The BMS, however, lauded the government for its current efforts on the massive vaccination programme, a special scheme for tea workers in West Bengal and Assam, labour oriented push on infrastructure projects in construction sector and development of five major fishing harbours viz. Kochi, Chennai, Visakhapatnam, Paradip, and Petuaghat as hubs for economic activities etc. On other Budget proposals, it said in a statement that "mixing the beautiful concept of Aatmanirbhar Bharat with FDI and disinvestment in the Union Budget is disappointing for the employees".
Never before in post-reforms India have Union Budgets seen a steady reduction in fiscal deficit for five consecutive years, points out A K Bhattacharya.
A combination of factors, including heavy investments in US Treasury bonds and dollar sales at a healthy profit, facilitated the Indian central bank in transferring a record surplus of Rs 2.11 trillion to the government for 2023-24 (FY24). The RBI's dollar purchases increased in FY24, supported by robust capital inflows endorsing the economy's health.
All the four listed private life insurance companies recorded a drop in value of new business (VNB) margin in the financial year 2023-24 (FY24) as compared to FY23. This is because of a higher share of unit-linked insurance plans (Ulips) in the product mix. VNB is a measure of the economic value of profits expected to emerge from a new business.
The actual expenditure will only be marginally higher and hence, the multiplier effect will be muted.
The country's 5,000 MPs, MLAs and MLCs should resolve in this historic year to return to the people the favour they have been doing by relentlessly nurturing democracy over the last 70 years, he said.
The Union Budget for 2011-12 comes at a critical juncture for the economy -- high inflation, tight liquidity, elevated fiscal and current account deficits, and a slowdown in the reform process have taken away the sheen from the India growth story.
After being elected president of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) in 1999, Najma Heptulla rang up the then Congress chief Sonia Gandhi from Berlin to convey the news but had to hold the phone line for an hour as a staff told her that 'madam is busy'.
No limit exists on the number of electoral bonds that a person (including corporate entities) can purchase.
Car sales in India grew 13.11 per cent to 2,11,402 units in February as customers rushed to buy vehicles fearing rise in prices post the Union Budget, to be presented this week.
Car sales in India grew 13.11 per cent to 2,11,402 units in February as customers rushed to buy vehicles fearing rise in prices post the Union Budget, to be presented this week.
Many were hoping that with Vajpayee's NDA gone, there would be a return to the Congress normal. Nobody was prepared for the opposite. Sonia Gandhi was sceptical. This became the only issue over which Manmohan Singh took on his party bosses and risked his government. Politically, it was riskier than the 1991 reform, recalls Shekhar Gupta.
Your plans to bring home a dream vehicle may just have become a little more distant, with automobile manufacturers considering price increases to offset the impact of higher excise duty levied in the Union Budget.
A wider fiscal deficit despite higher divestment will be a disappointing beginning.
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