The government will press ahead with the sale of public sector companies that have been approved by the Cabinet, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Thursday. Highlighting that FDI flow into India is much higher compared to other emerging economies, she said India's strong macroeconomic fundamentals, ability to do reforms and a stable government help attract long-term foreign funds into Indian businesses.
The rupee depreciation will work in favour of students who are currently studying in the US and plan to secure a job that pays in dollars.
'The government must provide more funds to enable the armed forces to fight and win tomorrow's wars,' states Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal (retd).
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.
It also assured that the amount of medical insurance coverage under the Ayushman Bharat scheme would be doubled from Rs 5 lakh to Rs 10 lakh.
IMF's Chief Economist Gita Gopinath on Thursday said it would be damaging for India to start tightening policy support in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and also stressed on reducing wasteful expenditures in the upcoming Budget. Delivering NCAER's '9th C D Deshmukh Lecture' virtually, Gopinath said there is scope for the Indian government to provide more direct support to people.
A sudden surge in wealth because of stock market gains after the pandemic could be one of the factors behind the relatively lower share of philanthropy in total wealth.
The information technology services sector will see a sharp fall in revenue growth to 12-13 per cent in FY23 from 19 per cent in FY22, ratings agency Crisil said on Thursday. However, the current depreciation in the rupee, strong demand for new age technologies like artificial intelligence, cloud computing and Internet of Things will help the over $220-billion sector maintain a double digit growth, it said in a report. The moderation from 19 per cent to 12-13 per cent will be the highest in the last eight years, it said and attributed the decline to expected tightening of IT expenditure by corporates amid the inflationary headwinds in the United States and European Union (EU), which together contribute almost 85 per cent to the sector's revenue.
M&M was the top loser in the Sensex pack, shedding around 3 per cent, followed by Tata Steel, Bajaj Finserv, TCS, HDFC and Infosys. NSE Nifty declined 55.95 points to 17,076.25.
India's projected economic growth for 2022 has been downgraded by over two per cent to 4.6% by the United Nations, a decrease attributed to the ongoing war in Ukraine, with New Delhi expected to face restraints on energy access and prices, reflexes from trade sanctions, food inflation, tightening policies and financial instability, according to a UN report released on Thursday. The UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) report downgraded its global economic growth projection for 2022 to 2.6 per cent from 3.6 per cent due to shocks from the Ukraine war and changes in macroeconomic policies that put developing countries particularly at risk. The report said while Russia will experience a deep recession this year, significant slowdowns in growth are expected in parts of Western Europe and Central, South and South-East Asia.
India is now much ahead of other large railway networks in the world in terms of electrification -- with the US at just 1 per cent, China at 72 per cent and Europe at 60 per cent.
In Kerala, the use of black ranges from such convenience to strictures by community and religion to fashion and personal choice. One would have to be really insecure or too fond of the well settled life to see black solely as a badge of protest, points out Shyam G Menon.
The appointment of new expenditure secretary comes a month-and-a-half ahead of the Budget for 2020-21 to be presented on February 1.
The Centre will release Rs 95,082 crore as tax devolution to the states this month after including one advance instalment to help them push their capital expenditure, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Monday. After a meeting with all chief ministers and state finance ministers, Sitharaman said states had said that it would be helpful for them if the tax devolution is front loaded.
The 2014 Australian Grand Prix posted a record A$59.97 million ($55 million) loss amid soaring costs and declining revenue, government officials said on Wednesday.
'The government has failed to understand the seriousness of the situation, and that's why they are underestimating the problem.' 'They think some tinkering here and there will fix the economy automatically.'
Not amused by imposition of President's Rule by the Centre, Rawat termed it as the 'murder of democracy'.
That's a big change that was made possible due to corporate tax cuts. Corporation tax collection in FY22 will be lower than even the FY18 levels, reports
The government has budgeted to cut the fiscal deficit to 3.3 per cent of GDP or Rs 6.24 lakh crore in 2018-19, from 3.53 per cent in the previous financial year.
Omkeshwar Singh, Head, Rank MF, a mutual fund investment platform, answers your queries.
Fund mobilisation by companies through equity and debt routes has dropped 20 per cent in 2022 to nearly Rs 11 lakh crore, as exuberance dwindled this year due to expensive credit avenues and volatile markets. The first half of 2023 could continue to remain challenging. The year 2021 was extraordinary for fundraising from the equity and debt routes, while 2022 has seen a slowdown in capital raising owing to elevated volatility provoked by unprecedented inflation globally and the Russia-Ukraine war.
If receipts from disinvestment, tax buoyancy and black money scheme offset shortfall in spectrum sale, higher expenditure due to pay commission's recommendations and capital expenditure, then the government would be able to meet the target of controlling fiscal deficit at 3.5 per cent of GDP this financial year.
After navigating the turbulent pandemic waves, the recovering Indian economy is now sailing through unchartered waters of rising coronavirus cases, spiralling commodity prices and spiking inflation though the lighthouse of sustainable growth remains visible. As 2022 begins, a raft of developments, ranging from Budgetary announcements to continuation of stimulus measures to monetary policy, will set the tone for the domestic economy, which is projected to grow more than 9 per cent in the current fiscal ending March 2022. The country's continuing massive vaccination drive and 'precaution' doses starting for select categories of people this month will provide a firewall against any steep spike in coronavirus cases amid the emergence of the Omicron variant.
How long will the RBI allow the government to borrow cheaply? A change in policy direction will see rates climb and bond values fall. Investors in debt funds are therefore at risk, as are people invested in the heated stock market, warns T N Ninan.
'You may see some movement indicating a simpler tax regime with less exemptions but with fewer tax rates making life simpler for taxpayers.'
The registration was cancelled as Infosys Foundation allegedly did not file income and expenditure statement on foreign funding for the past few years, officials said.
A K Bhattacharya lists three reasons why Finance Minister Arun Jaitley will most likely present a full Budget on February 1, 2019.
Apart from being the most successful cases under the IBC, Bhushan Steel and Essar Steel are among the best steel assets in the country. They also ended up helping their lenders get back a significant chunk of the money while allowing Tata Steel to consolidate its position and giving the world's two largest steel makers - ArcelorMittal and Nippon Steel - a strong foothold in India. A significant contrast was the pace at which these two cases were resolved under the bankruptcy code. In the annals of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC), Essar Steel may go down in history as the most noticeable resolution with the world's largest steelmaker, ArcelorMittal, and the incumbent, Ruia family, locked in an intense battle spanning more than two years and ultimately resulting in full recovery of the principal amount for the financial creditors.
Besides advancing the presentation of the Budget to perhaps the first week of January, , there are four new initiatives that could be rolled out from the next Budget, says A K Bhattacharya.
With the world's worst outbreak of COVID-19 severely straining the health system in the country, the government has made sweeping changes in the way departments procure medical supplies, including allowing procurement of the same item at different rates.
The Union government told the Nagpur bench of the Bombay high court that audit statement of receipt and payment accounts of the PM CARES Fund for 2019-20 was available on the trust's website.
This is part of the first batch of Supplementary Demands for Grants for 2020-21 moved by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in the Lok Sabha.
Expressing commitment to augment the country's infrastructure, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday proposed to significantly enhance capital expenditure to Rs 5.54 lakh crore in the next fiscal, besides creating institutional structures and giving a big thrust to monetizing assets to achieve the goals of the National Infrastructure Pipeline (NIP). Sitharaman said NIP, that was launched in December 2019 with 6,835 projects, has now been expanded to 7,400 projects and around 217 projects worth Rs 1.10 lakh crore under some key infrastructure ministries have been completed. "For 2021-22, I propose a sharp increase in capital expenditure and thus have provided Rs 5.54 lakh crores which is 34.5% more than the BE of 2020-21," the finance minister said.
Shankar Prajapati, a 57-year-old potter in Dharavi, has given up hope of getting a bigger house for his family. He lives cheek by jowl in a hutment measuring 200 square (sq.) feet (ft) in the nondescript shanty town. "We have surrendered to our fate. We cannot wait forever for better accommodation. "Perhaps we are not meant to dream big," despairs Prajapati. Raju Korde, president, Dharavi Redevelopment Committee, and a local resident, agrees with Prajapati.
Sitharaman does away with loans from National Small Savings Fund to Food Corporation of India.
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is India's most-valuable brand in 2022 replacing HDFC Bank, which held the number one spot since 2014, according to Kantar BrandZ report on India's most-valuable brands. TCS was able to grab the top slot due to rising global demand for automation and digital transformation, following the pandemic. Indian brands have bounced back from the pandemic to increase their brand value by 35 per cent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) since 2020.
The government had pegged the fiscal deficit for 2020-21 at Rs 7.96 lakh crore or 3.5 per cent of the GDP in the budget presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in February.
The Comptroller and Auditor General of India on Monday reported multiple irregularities in the accounts of units under the IT and telecom ministries, including purchases of hardware and software worth Rs 890 crore by NICSI in contravention of rules. In its audit report for financial years 2017-18 and 2018-19, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has flagged anomalies in the decision taken by state-run telecom firm BSNL, C-DoT, the Department of Posts, ITI Limited and CDAC that had adverse financial implications. "NICSI procured hardware and software costing Rs 890.34 crore through the 'Strategic Alliance' route in contravention of General Financial Rules, 2005 and departmental instructions and thus failed to ensure transparency and competitiveness in the procurement process," according to the CAG report tabled in Lok Sabha on Monday.
India's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is expected to expand by 9.2 per cent in the current financial year, according to the Economic Survey 2021-22 tabled in the parliament on Monday. "Advance estimates suggest that the Indian economy is expected to witness real GDP expansion of 9.2 per cent in 2021-22 after contracting in 2020-21. "This implies that overall economic activity has recovered past the pre-pandemic levels," Economic Survey noted. Almost all indicators show that the economic impact of the "second wave" in Q1 was much smaller than that experienced during the full lockdown phase in 2020-21 even though the health impact was more severe, it said.
It is now becoming increasingly clear that rising imports have played a significant role in sustaining the buoyancy in revenues from GST, notes A K Bhattacharya.
