Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has questioned the granting of hefty funds to certain states by Pranab Mukherjee, the United Progressive Alliance's Presidential candidate, and sought to know if this was meant to influence the ruling parties including Samajwadi Party, Janata Dal - United and the Trinamool Congress.
The MPs went right up to the entrance of South Block, but were stopped at the first check point.
Just as the umpire's decision is no longer final, what is disdainfully rejected is the age-old dictum that the game should be played and watched in the spirit of the game, sighs Uddalok Bhattacharya.
'At this point of time, West Bengal is doing better than other states in tackling the crisis. We have a chief minister who herself has hit the streets to do what is to be done, and at the same time ensuring a proper lockdown. She is also trying day and night to set up the requisite infrastructure.'
Forbes magazine has honoured Bandhan of being the world's largest micro finance institute.
'Amit Shah was, briefly, a stockbroker before devoting himself to politics. By instinct or training, he knows the value of keeping blue chips in one's portfolio.'
Sources in the West Bengal government's finance department said the state had made budgetary provisions that would run into several hundred crores every year for 20 to 30 years to attract Tata Motors' Nano project to Singur.
The Day in Politics: Featuring Dr Singh, Messrs Kejriwal and Sisodia and Mamatadi.
Performance-based incentives were recommended by the 13th Finance Commission, but omitted by the 14th Finance Commission
'Union Budgets are often used as political instruments and that was the intention of this government too.' 'But while the exercise has settled two fronts, it has left open several others and this has the potential to aggravate with time,' predicts Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
Several BJP-backed state governments have unveiled schemes targeting the poor, women, farmers and students, following the party's setback in the Lok Sabha polls.
The closed-door discussions between Kishor and Pawar at the latter's residence lasted for about one-and-a-half hours, sources said.
While presenting the Union Budget 2021-22 in Parliament, the finance minister said poll-bound West Bengal will see highway projects worth Rs 25,000 crore. She also announced that highway projects worth Rs 65,000 crore will be undertaken in Kerala. She also announced an Rs 18,000-crore scheme to augment public transport in urban areas.
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present the Interim Budget on February 1 ahead of the Lok Sabha elections likely to be held in April-May.
He will succeed Kerala Finance Minister K M Mani.
The finance ministry has set up two committees of state finance ministers which would rework rate slabs, review GST exempt items and identify potential evasion sources. Four years after the roll out of the national Goods and Services Tax (GST), which replaced the complex indirect tax structure, the centre and states have started work on moving towards a "simpler rate structure in GST" by reviewing the current rate slabs, including special rates and merger of rate slabs. The Group of Ministers (GoM) on rate rationalisation would also review items under inverted duty structure to help minimise refund payout, and review the supply of goods and services exempt under GST with an objective to expand the tax base and eliminate breaking of input tax credit (ITC) chain.
The BJP doesn't want to focus entirely on an anti-Mamata campaign.
With the reality of coalition politics staring the BJP in its face, this was inevitable, points out Ramesh Menon.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday assured farmer leaders led by Rakesh Tikait and Yudhvir Singh of support to their agitation against the new agriculture laws.
Banerjee, however, didn't clarify whether any other minister of her cabinet would attend the meeting on her behalf or not.
Denied of any relief from the UPA-II government, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday pinned her hopes on the new BJP government at the Centre for a positive response on the state's huge debt repayment problem.
'Since the NDA took office in 2014, and aggressively since 2019, the Union government seems hell bent on centralising all power and resources, only to fail spectacularly.'
Appreciating efforts of West Bengal to attract investments, the finance minister said the Centre would extend all support to the Trinamool-government to promote industry and boost growth in the state.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday said the government will roll back a steep interest rate cut on small saving schemes such as PPF and NSC -- saying it was an oversight, a move being seen as an attempt by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party to contain the fallout of a decision hitting the common man in the ongoing elections in West Bengal, Assam and three other states.
Ponzi or MLM schemes are fraudulent investment operations.
The organisation established its electoral presence post-Independence in states such as Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and Assam, with West Bengal being its main stronghold, but eight decades down the line, the party, now limited to just some pockets of the country, has no MP or MLA in its kitty.
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu and his Telangana counterpart Revanth Reddy visited some inundated areas in their respective territories.
The Rajya Sabha on Wednesday approved the biggest tax reform since Independence.
'You don't win elections on the basis of borrowed players.' 'There is a great crisis of leadership for the BJP in Bengal'
In an apparent reference to political differences between Bharatiya Janata Party and Trinamool Congress, Jaitley said there are national causes to stand together, notwithstanding political differences.
What some of our leaders were up to in the last couple of days.
It epitomises a significant opportunity lost, just when the state was beginning to shed three decades of leftist inhibitions in favour of economic reform.
While the likelihood of these states going the Lanka or Greece way may be an alarming assessment, the financial situation of some states such as Punjab and West Bengal is indeed quite weak.
The government has sanctioned Rs 95.61 crore to Maoist-affected states, including West Bengal, under the 'Special Assistance Scheme' to carry out speedy development works. The amount has been sanctioned to Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal.
The demand for extension of the GST cess regime among others was made by several state finance ministers at a pre-budget consultation called by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in New Delhi. Besides, many states also demanded raising the share of the Union government in the Centrally Sponsored Schemes (CSS). Currently, the central government and state government share in some CSS is 60:40 while in others it is 75:25.
DFC is the US government's development finance institution. Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Limited (APSEZ) in a statement said that the US fund will support the development of deepwater shipping container terminal in the Port of Colombo.
A day after slamming Narendra Modi as "Butcher of Gujarat", the Trinamool Congress on Monday demanded that the Gujarat Chief Minister should apologise publicly or face a defamation case for questioning the sale of Mamata Banerjee's painting.
Facing a deepening slowdown, the auto sector is pinning hopes on the GST Council meeting on September 20 for a rate cut from 28 per cent to 18 per cent. However, states including Bihar, West Bengal, Kerala, and Punjab are of the view that the slowdown in the auto sector is not because of the GST rate but structural issues in the economy.
Shah attacked Banerjee over the alleged culture of political violence in the state, saying the only industry that was flourishing in Bengal was that of "crude bombs and illegal weapons".
Accordingly, West Bengal can borrow Rs 20,362 crore, Maharashtra (Rs 46,182 crore), Uttar Pradesh (Rs 29,108 crore), Karnataka (Rs 27,054 crore), Gujarat (Rs 26,112 crore) and Rajasthan (Rs 16,387 crore).
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