Men finally catch up with women. Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee on Friday hiked the annual income tax exemption limit by Rs. 20,000—but only for men.
Women tax payers stand to gain only by Rs. 10,000. Mukherjee merged the exemption limits for both men and women at Rs. 2 lakh per annum, thus brining to an end a practice of several years that fixed a higher exemption level for women.

The Direct Tax Code which will be implemented at the earliest, envisages a uniform tax code for both men and women tax payers.

For women tax payers of the country, the annual income tax exemption limit was hitherto fixed at Rs. 1.9 lakh. 

Though DTC will not be implemented from April, 1, 2012, as proposed earlier, the government had decided to tweak certain areas to bring it in sync with what the bill has envisaged.

Of the total tax payers in the country, women comprise 25.95%, while 5.53% of the returns were filed by senior citizens.

RN Dhoot, the president of industry body Assocham, however said he was expecting that the personal income tax exemption limit would be raised to Rs2.5 lakh per annum.