Jaitley said normally budgets are known for imposing higher taxation.
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However, this year was supposed to be different.
Arun Jaitley quotes Mahatma Gandhi, says right cause never fails (on demonetisation). He also added that boosting the private sector, which is reeling under the effect of demonetisation is another major challenge in front of the government.
Ray of ICRA said, “The reduction of income tax for companies below Rs. 50 crores is a positive, though the industry would have expected some relief on corporate tax for larger entities as well”.
The Budget proposes to halve the existing personal income tax rate of ten percent for taxpayers earning an annual income between INR250,000 (USD3,713) and INR500,000.
Finally this is the first budget to have mentioned the issue of transparency in political funding.
In the Budget, Mr Jaitley unveiled moves to curb cash donations and ban cash payments above 300,000 rupees from April 1, as part of an anti-corruption drive. That kind of extreme poverty means India’s health system must contend with problems like a high rate of infant mortality and communicable diseases nearly eradicated in other parts of the world, like tuberculosis. “Our government was elected amidst huge expectations”. It is not a bold Budget. “The government has realised that housing and infrastructure can be two pillars to increase GDP and accelerate economic growth”, he said. Any amount above that would have to be given by cheque, or digitally, and so can not be anonymous. This indicates the total borrowing requirements of the government from all sources. They will, hopefully, use this information for better income tax administration in the future.
Appeal to all citizens of India to contribute to nation building by making a small payment of 5 percent tax if their income is falling in the lowest slab of 2.5 lakh to 5 lakh.
The Budget also allocated Rs 1.3 lakh crore for development of railways. There’s no point on relying excessively on indirect taxes, because they are unfair.
He said, “In the road sector I have stepped up the budget allocation for the National Highways from Rs 57,676 crore in the BE of 2016-17 to Rs 64,000 crore in 2017-18”. This was done to coax those outside the tax net to file their Income Tax returns. The CMIE has reported that previous year this time, the inflow of private investment was to the tune of Rs. 2.5 lakh crore.
With the implementation of Goods and Service Tax (GST), the scope for generation of black money itself will become more hard. Nominal GDP growth at 11.75 per cent and Gross tax revenue growth at 12.25 per cent is very realistic and assumes mild buoyancy in the economy. One of the mobile wallet firm’s founder also told HT that the government could have taken some decisions to reduce service charge on transactions, like it did for e-tickets being booked through IRCTC.
The Budget unveiled yesterday represented an effort to win the support of voters by blunting the negative impact of the government’s controversial move past year to get rid of black money by demonetising high-value currency, say analysts. Government has pushed the digital theme in every area of the budget. The MNREGA scheme has been given a big boost with a whopping allocation of Rs 48,000 crore.
For the urban common man, there is not anything significant in the Budget beyond the cut in income tax rate for the lowest slaband sops for housing and real estate.
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February 3 (ANI): The Budget for the fiscal year 2017-18 comes in the backdrop of few significant changes and reforms taking place in the country, including demonetisation of the high-end currency notes since November 2016 and the anticipation built around the upcoming Goods and Service Tax (GST) Bill in April 2017.
