Financial Express (1 February 2022) – Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented her fourth Budget today. FM Sitharaman’s Budget speech started at 11:00 am in Parliament. This is Narendra Modi government’s tenth Budget, and the second paperless budget in view of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic situation. India’s economic growth in FY22 to be at 9.2 per cent, highest among all large economies, said FM in her address. India in a strong position to withstand challenges due to higher vaccinations, she added.
Highlights of Budget 2022 speech:
– Union Budget seeks to lay foundation & give blueprint of economy over ‘Amrit Kal’ of next 25 years – from India at 75 to India at 100
– Budget to focus on 4 pillars – productivity, climate action, financing investments and PM Gati Shakti plan
– 400 new generation Vande Bharat trains with better efficiency to be brought in and 100 PM Gati Shakti Cargo terminals to be developed during next 3 years
– ECLGS to be extended till March 2023. The guaranteed cover will be expanded by Rs 50,000 crores to total cover of Rs 5 lakh crores to aid MSME sector financing needs
– Draft DPRs for 5 river links Damanganga-Pinjal, Par- Tapi-Narmada, Godavari-Krishna, Krishna-Pennar & Pennar-Kaveri have been finalized. Once consensus is reached among beneficiary states, centre will provide support for implementation
– 5G spectrum auction to be conducted in 2022 for rollout of 5G telecom services by private players in FY 2022-23
– To facilitate domestic manufacturing for ambitious goal of 280 GW of installed solar capacity by 2030, additional allocation of Rs 19,500 cr for PLI for manufacturing of high-efficiency modules with priority to fully integrate manufacturing units to solar PV modules will be made
– Digital rupee to be issued using blockchain and other technologies; to be issued by RBI starting 2022-23. This will give a big boost to the economy
– Income tax relief to cooperative societies with reduction in rate of surcharge from 12% to 7% for income upto Rs 10 crores
– Taxpayers can now file an updated return within 2 years from the relevant assessment year
– Income from virtual digital assets brought under tax net. Gaines taxable at 30% without any deduction except cost of acquisition
– Both Centre and States govt employees’ tax deduction limit to be increased from 10% to 14% to help the social security benefits of state govt employees and bring them at par with the Central govt employees
– Capital expenditure outlay being stepped up sharply by 35.4% from Rs 5.54 lakh crore in CY to Rs 7.50 lakh crore in 2022-23. Outlay in 2022-23 will be 2.9% of the GDP