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Union Budget 2021 explained through 10 headlines
The budget for the fiscal year beginning April made no changes in personal or corporate tax rates but raised customs duties on certain auto parts, mobile phone components and solar panels in order to provide impetus to domestic manufacturing.
Presenting her third budget, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday proposed a sharp increase in expenditure on infrastructure, doubling of healthcare spending and raising the cap on foreign investment in insurance for the next fiscal in a bid to pull the economy out of the pandemic-induced trough.
The budget for the fiscal year beginning April made no changes in personal or corporate tax rates but raised customs duties on certain auto parts, mobile phone components and solar panels in order to provide impetus to domestic manufacturing.
Here are the 10 stories you need to read to understand the country's budget:
Union Budget 2021: A look at allocations made to major schemes
Sitharaman announced a slew of measures to aid the recovery of the economy battered by the coronavirus pandemic. Her budget speech in Parliament began at 11am, in which the finance minister highlighted the difficulties India and other global economies faced due to Covid-19.
Read the full story here
Focus on Covid-19 vaccines, tax relief for elderly mark Budget 2021: 10 points
A large chunk of the budget was allocated to manufacturing more Covid-19 vaccines and for building road infrastructure in four poll-bound states. The finance minister announced that two more coronavirus vaccines were likely to be rolled out this year apart from the Serum Institute of India’s Covishield and the indigenous Covaxin by Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech.
Read the full story here.
Union Budget 2021: Here is what will be dearer and cheaper now
The finance minister proposed a custom duty hike on imported parts which would lead to commonly used items including refrigerators, air conditioners, LED lights and mobile phones to become expensive. While gold and silver will become cheaper as a result of rationalisation in customs duty on imports of these precious metals.
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Rural budget gets 10% hike, livelihood scheme gets 48% jump in fund
The Centre continued to pump in more money into rural India with a 10% hike in the rural development ministry’s annual budget for the upcoming financial year, as against the FY20-21 budget estimate. But the allocation fell short by ₹66,000 crore than the ongoing financial year’s revised estimate, which was astronomically hiked to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdown of the economy.
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India spent ₹20,776 crore on emergency defence purchase amid border row
India spent ₹20,776 crore on the emergency purchase of weapons and systems to beef up its military capabilities to deal with new security challenges in the midst of a lingering border dispute with China in eastern Ladakh, where both armies have deployed 100,000 soldiers and advanced weaponry in their forward and depth areas, budget documents showed on Monday.
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Budget 2021: Sitharaman quotes Tagore, talks of cricket to drive her point home
Every Union Budget is presented in a distinct rhetorical style. While some finance ministers of yesteryears have fallen back on Bollywood one-liners to make their point, Sitharaman used some literary references and India's historic win against Australia in cricket in her budget speech.
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Union Budget: 2 PSU banks, 1 insurance firm to be privatised, LIC IPO this year
Sitharaman announced that two public sector banks and one general insurance company will be privatised. She also said initial public offering (IPO) of Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) will take place in the financial year beginning April. The government also announced ₹20,000 crore recapitalisation of PSU banks.
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India allots over ₹7,000 cr as foreign aid, commits ₹100 cr to Chabahar port
India unveiled an outlay of more than ₹7,000 crore as foreign assistance in the budget for 2021-22, primarily for countries in the neighbourhood, and allocated ₹100 crore for Iran’s Chabahar port in a signal of its continuing commitment to the strategic project.
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Interest on employee contribution to PF above ₹2.5 lakh a year, now taxable
The finance minister announced proposals to restrict tax exemption for the interest income earned on the employees’ contribution to various provident funds for high-income employees.
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Union Budget 2021: NRIs allowed to operate One Person Companies in India
While presenting the Union Budget 2021, Sitharaman said that it proposes to incentivise incorporation of one person companies (OPCs). She added that the non-resident Indians (NRIs) will also be allowed to incorporate OPCs in India.
Read the full story here.
