'The first duty of the government is to learn lessons from a bad experience and course correct. It's a pity that the government is making policy without looking at evidence and differentiating between immediate and urgent.'
The finance ministry is working on a second relief package for the Indian economy hit hard by the coronavirus outbreak and the 21-day nationwide lockdown imposed to curb the contagion, sources said. Last month, the government announced a Rs 1.70 lakh crore relief package in the form of foodgrains and cash transfers for the poor and vulnerable section of the society to help them deal with the hardships caused by the lockdown. Now, the government is working on a stimulus to be given to hard-hit sectors of the economy after the lockdown is lifted, sources said, adding that an announcement is expected in the next few days depending on the severity of the pandemic.
'He will go to any extent, and he will have the full support of the Union government as they may not like a Left government to continue here.'
"So you will not have anything better... democracy loving, capitalist respecting environment... in India," Sitharaman said at the event hosted by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry in association with the US India Strategic and Partnership Forum.
'Each state and central government body may be asked to update its system to ensure PAN is used as a common identification to access its services.'
India to hold one-to-one meetings with global counterparts to trace blackmoney.
The agency had received Rs 946.51 crore to manage its affairs in the Budget Estimates for 2023-24, which was later increased to Rs 968.86 crore in the Revised Estimates.
The richest one per cent in India now own more than 40 per cent of the country's total wealth, while the bottom half of the population together share just 3 per cent of wealth, a new study showed on Monday.
The Group of Ministers, set up to look into the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh, met on Monday for discussion with Union ministry secretary-level officers.
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will address a press conference in New Delhi at 4 pm on Wednesday. The information regarding the press conference by the Union finance minister was given through a tweet by the ministry of finance in the morning.
The defence budget was on Thursday increased to Rs 6.21 lakh crore for 2024-25 in a modest hike of 4.72 per cent from last year's allocation of Rs 5.25 lakh crore amid India's continuing border row with China in eastern Ladakh as well as concerns over evolving security situation in the strategic waterways.
Top Congress sources said they would not hold up the Bill.
'Not even a single rupee from the electoral bonds should be allowed to be used in the election.' 'If it is used in the election, it will taint India's electoral process itself.'
Rationalisation of income tax slabs, infrastructure status for digital services and incentives to hydrogen storage as well as fuel cell development were some of the suggestions made by various stakeholders at the pre-Budget consultation meeting convened by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. The customary pre-Budget consultation meetings were held with the finance minister virtually between December 15 and December 22, as per the finance ministry statement. More than 120 invitees representing seven stakeholder groups participated in eight meetings, scheduled during this period, it said.
Union finance secretary T V Somanathan recently said the Centre had saved Rs 10,000 crore in FY22 on interest payments after adopting new accounting mechanisms for central government agencies and centrally sponsored schemes (CSS) for state governments. Speaking at an event, Somanathan said due to these, there was an unspent balance of Rs 1.2 trillion with state agencies from CSS as on March 31, 2022. This means this amount will be reduced from the Centre's borrowing for now and it can be considered a short-term saving for the exchequer.
Finance Minister P T R Palanivel Thiagarajan has proclaimed his determination to set Tamil Nadu's fiscal house in order in five years, and Friday will show how he plans to go about it when he rises to present the Stalin government's maiden budget, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will on Monday meet chief ministers and state finance ministers to discuss measures to attract private investments to help boost the economy. Finance secretary T V Somanathan said the meeting comes in the backdrop of strong economic recovery post the two COVID waves, and the central government has made a big push in Capex. The focus of this interaction will be on state-level issues, opportunities and challenges, which will enable us to go to a higher trajectory of investment and growth, he said.
With a comprehensive SEZ Act in place, the Union Commerce and Industry minister Kamal Nath said his ministry would go ahead with the plans to develop SEZs across the country, despite oppositions from the finance ministry.
It would perhaps make more sense if the finance ministry gave greater emphasis on the need for a similar exercise to phase out exemptions and concessions in indirect taxes like customs and excise.
The richest one per cent in India now own more than 40 per cent of the country's total wealth, while the bottom half of the population together share just 3 per cent of wealth, a new study showed on Monday. Releasing the India supplement of its annual inequality report on the first day of the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, rights group Oxfam International said that taxing India's ten-richest at 5 per cent can fetch entire money to bring children back to school. "A one-off tax on unrealized gains from 2017-2021 on just one billionaire, Gautam Adani, could have raised Rs 1.79 lakh crore, enough to employ more than five million Indian primary school teachers for a year," it added.
Vardhan had said on Friday, "Doctors at AIIMS are doing the best they can."
Banks will also consider requests from MSMEs for restructuring their stressed standard assets. So far, only 25 per cent of the around 1 million eligible MSMEs have taken benefit of the RBI's special dispensation.
"We firmly hold that undermining the central bank is a recipe for disaster and government must desist," All India Reserve Bank Association said in a letter. The association said Acharya's comments about the government's interventionist role vis-a-vis the RBI has created a flutter across the nation. "This is, however, not a sudden outburst, but was waiting to happen due to long simmering discontent," the association said.
The MPs went right up to the entrance of South Block, but were stopped at the first check point.
'I'm very much against petrol and diesel....'' 'I travel in an electric car.' 'I have had a really good experience with it.'
About a million railway employees participated in the strike ballot of NFIR. In December, 800,000 employees participated in the strike ballot conducted by another leading union, the All India Railwaymen Federation, with 96 per cent voting in favour of a strike.
Amid concerns raised by RBI over its autonomy, the central bank has for the first time sought the Finance Ministry's nod for wage revision in the apex bank.
A decision on the interest rate for close to 60 million active subscribers of the Employee Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) is likely to be taken in the next Central Board of Trustee (CBT) meeting, starting on March 25. A letter from the social security organisation regarding the convening of the 233rd CBT meeting was sent to all the board members last week, soliciting their presence in the meeting. Although the venue and the agenda haven't been drawn out yet, sources familiar with the matter say that the interest rate is unlikely to go below 8 per cent level amid a rising interest rate scenario across the globe.
The Union labour ministry has said that it can invest part of the Rs 5 lakh crore (Rs 5 trillion) provident fund corpus in the stock market provided the finance ministry guarantees safety of the workers' money.
The Union ministry of consumer affairs has given the finishing touches to the policy framework to allow foreign direct investment and foreign institutional investment in India's national commodity exchanges.
Under the proposed mechanism, the finance ministry has said banks will notify customers when someone tries to deposit money in their accounts, a government official said.
Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh posed questions for the prime minister ahead of his rallies in Karnataka.
Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari on Wednesday pitched for formulating a policy for using the Reserve Bank of India's rising foreign exchange reserves for funding road projects, saying the country needs low cost finance for such infrastructure projects. Addressing a virtual event organised by industry body CII, Gadkari further said that the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) should also have a financial arm like the power ministry's Power Finance Corporation (PFC). "We have a surplus of dollar reserves in the country. I have decided to talk with the RBI Governor, about how we can formulate a policy by which we can use this foreign exchange reserves for development of infrastructure in the country," he said.
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.
The Supreme Court on Friday asked the Army to put its "house in order", saying that it feels that it has not been "fair" to the women officers who have alleged delay in promotions after being granted permanent commission on the directions of the top court in 2020.
Capital expenditure by 54 large central public sector enterprises and five departmental arms, having a capex minimum target of Rs 100 crore, rose 93 per cent year-on-year (YoY) in the April-May period to Rs 1.39 trillion. The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) and the Railways have started this financial year's capex cycle on a stronger note. In the first two months of FY24, the 54 CPSEs, along with the departmental arms, achieved 19 per cent of their combined budget target of Rs 7.33 trillion, Business Standard has learnt.
The Finance Ministry has asked all banks, including private sector lenders, to open branches in locations with population of more than 5,000 in the under-banked districts by September, 2012.
Further, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the banks have sufficient liquidity, and efforts are being made to ensure that due payments are released to the micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) sector by large corporates.
Poor predictability, credibility and effectiveness of fiscal performance have been key reasons for successive governments failing to deliver on their promises.
General Budget is a terminology earlier used to differentiate between the Union Budget with the Railway Budget. Full-fledged budgets are titled "Union Budget", while interim Budgets are titled just that.
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