Beginning not with bigger policy changes, your humble columnist starts with what's costlier and what's cheaper after the FinMin rolled out the budget for the Fiscal year 2015-16. The flashy phones and tablets imported from abroad will see a price hike due to a hike in the excise duty, while their humbler Indian counterparts will sell cheaper because of reduction of customs duty for Indian made goods. Next time your bulb fuses replace it with a Made in India LED , as it comes cheaper because of the said reason. This reduce in the customs duty for locally manufactured products is another way for promoting Make in India, which has been a significant initiative of the new government. Setting up of MUDRA Bank with a corpus of Rs. 20,000 crore to refinance micro finance institutions was another step towards encouraging institutionalised credit among the people at the bottom of the income pyramid.
For bringing in private capital , into infrastructure via the PPP model a National Investment and Infrastructure Fund has been set up. Tax free infrastructure bonds for roads, rails and irrigation have also been planned.Skilled India, another project close to the present government's heart, was given a boost by announcing the setting up of 6 new AIIMSs and two new IIMs. In his speech the FinMin talked about the need for increasing the reach of school level in India. He allocated funds for upgrading the present primary and secondary schools into senior secondary schools, and setting up schools in the areas where there were none. He articulated a vision of every child having a school within 5 kilometres of her place of residence. For the Nirbhaya Fund , a corpus of Rs. 1,500 crore was announced. The MNREGS, the future of which was doubted by many till yesterday, was allocated Rs. 34,699 crore. The FinMin also said that he would try to raise funds from the market, for increasing this allocation by Rs. 5,000 crore. The FinMin also said, "Defence of every square inch of our motherland comes before anything else....". But, the allocation for defence outlay increased by a paltry 7.4% , which came a disappointment to the Defence Minister, who was seen rubbing his thumb and index finger while smiling, as if to ask "Where is the money ?"
For the middle class the budget doesn't offer too much. There have been no changes on personal tax rates or income slabs. The wealth tax for the High Net Worth individuals has been replaced by a surcharge of 2% of the net taxable income. The FinMin promised a stable taxation regime, while promising to decrease the taxes on industries from 30% to 25% over the next four years. He said this would be accompanied by removal of exemptions which were given to the industries. This brought out vociferous protests from the opposition benches. Selling this reform to the public would be a difficult task and the FinMin would have to prove the tax neutrality of the arrangement to the people. While the process for making people understand has begun, with the FinMin taking questions from the public via twitter hashtag #AskYourFM, more steps need to be taken. What would the government do, is a question that would be answered in due course. In the meanwhile, smoke less. Cigarettes are injurious to your lungs and your pocket!
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