Articles

We hereby highlighting the budget presented by the Honorable Finance Minister Mr. Arun Jaitley. In our opinion, this budget is very courage and bold budget though this budget is a last full year budget for the ruling NDA Party. This budget neither a freebee nor too much of spending as well. The budget focus more on farmers, senior citizen, but left the salaried class and investors in a lurch.

Fiscal Deficit

FY19 fiscal deficit estimated at 3.3 percent of the GDP.

Fiscal deficit for 2017-18 is likely to be higher at 3.5 percent compared to the targeted 3.2 percent of the GDP.

Direct Taxes

No change in income tax slabs for individuals.

Standard deduction of Rs 40,000 for the salaried class in lieu of transport and medical reimbursement.
Senior citizen deduction for health insurance raised to Rs 50,000.
Reduced corporate tax of 25 percent extended to companies with an annual turnover of Rs 250 crore.
Senior citizen gains arouse from interest is increased from Rs.10,000 to Rs.50,000

Long-Term Capital Gains Tax

10 percent long-term capital gains tax on equity gains above Rs 1 lakh.-

For existing investors, the government has proposed to grandfather all gains up to January 31, 2018. This means, irrespective of the price you bought the share or units of MFs, the government would consider the highest price quoted on January 31, 2018 as the date of acquisition of shares or units of MFs. However, the LTCG is applicable only from 1st Apr-2018 onwards.




Dividends from equity funds are no longer tax free-dividends on equity funds will be taxed at 10%.

Short-term capital gains tax for selling shares within one year remains at 15 percent.
Health and education cess increased to 4 percent from 3 percent.

Divestment

Target to raise funds by selling stakes in state-run companies raised to Rs 80,000 crore.
National Insurance Company, United Insurance Company, United India Assurance and Oriental Insurance will be merged and listed.
Government to raise more than Rs 1 lakh crore through divestment in the ongoing financial year against a target of Rs 72,500 crore.

Agriculture
To raise minimum support price for kharif season crops to 1.5 times of agri production cost—that is cost plus 50 percent.
The government will spend Rs 14.34 lakh crore on rural infrastructure across various schemes and departments.

Healthcare
National Health Protection Scheme for 10 crore families.
It provides a health cover of Rs 5 lakh per family a year.

Education
To invest Rs 1 lakh crore on education infrastructure over four years.
To initiate integrated B.Ed programme for aspiring teachers



Infrastructure
Rs 5.97 lakh crore for infrastructure in FY19 compared with Rs 4.94 lakh crore in the revised estimates of FY18.
Smart city projects worth Rs 20,852 crore in progress.

Railways, Air Connectivity
Railways to get Rs 1.48 lakh crore for capital expenditure.

Digital India
Government doesn’t consider cryptocurrencies as legal tender.