Today is the D-Day – The Indian Union Budget 2013-14 will be presented in the Parliament today. Every one is watching and everyone is talking about it and like every year, we will be following the Union Budget closely and will be bringing you the highlights and announcement as they happen.
You can also follow the updates on our Twitter account at @trakin
The Budget will start at 11:00 am [February 28th, 2013]:
1.) P. Chidambaram starts his Budget speech, and he plans to keep it short ad simple.
2.) Only China and Indonesia are growing faster than India in 2012-13 and if growth happens as per expectation, only China will be ahead of us going forward.
3.) The biggest worry for P. Chidambaram right now is Current Account Deficit, which is very high and this budget will address that issue on higher priority basis
4.) SC, ST, Women and minorities get funds allocated for their growth. Rs. 200 Crore allocated to women and child ministry to come up with schemes for their safety in personal as well as work environment.
5.) Allotment of 41,564 crore for SC/STs and allotment of Rs. 25498 crore for tribal welfare.
6.) Education Ministry of HRD gets 65,000 crore rupees for improvement of education in India
7.) Health and Education are priority for all and above par budget allocation has been made in this budget!
8.) @deepkshenoy tweeted that “Max interest deduction on home loans, raised to 2.5 lakh! #Budget2013 Glitch in Rajya sabha TV showed that :)”
9.) Infrastructure sector to need investment of 1 Trillion US dollars or 55 lakh crore rupees. Govt. will encourage Infra debt funds.
10.) FM announces measures to lure investors in Infrastructure and plans to introduce Tax-Free bonds.
11.) Zero customs duty for Semi-conductor pre-fab wafers as it needs future of electronics Industry.
12) Rajiv Gandhi Equity Savings Scheme will be liberalized to enable the 1st time investor. Income limit will be raised from 10 lakh to 12 lakh.
13) On Home Loans, a consumer taking a home loan on his first home between 2012-13 to 2013-14 will be entitled to additional deduction of interest of 1 Lakh. This does not seem to be applicable for existing loans.
14) MSME or Medium sized businesses will enjoy the same benefits for 3 years even after they become a large entity
15) Refinancing capacity of ISDBI increased to 10k crore from existing 5k crore.
16) MCA will notify that funds to tech incubators (approved) will qualify as CSR (2% contribution as per Company Bill)
17) 3,000 km of road projects will be awarded in first 6 months of FY13-14
18) First Bank to be setup in India that will be exclusively be setup India’s first women bank as a public sector bank and 1000 cr have been allocated for this cause. Approvals will be got by Oct 2013.
19) If a foreign entity has less than 10% investment in a company it will be categorized as FII and if it is more than that it will be categorized at FDI
20) SEBI will take steps to make sure that Foreign Investors entry into India is simplified
21) Informed investors can invest directly in Non-IPO SME companies
22) The allocation for defense has been increased to Rs. 203,672 crore rupees
23) 294 more cities will be covered by private radio channels, 839 new FM channels to be auctioned in 2013-14.
24) Rs. 6275 crore will be allocated to Science and Technology Ministry
25) Neither the Tax Slabs not the exemption Limits have been increased for Personal Income Tax.
26) For people between Rs. 2 Lakh and Rs. 5 Lakh bracket will get a Tax credit of Rs. 2000
27) For Super Rich who have income more than 1 crore a year will be levied 10% surcharge.
28) Also, 10% Surcharge will be levied on Companies with Income over Rs 10 crore for a year
29) Duties on Leather Goods machinery reduced
30) Increase of import duty on Set-top boxes
31) Environment friendly vehicles get further tax sops
32) Luxury vehicles imports like Motorcycles, Yatches, Cards will attract more duty
33) Low priced Mobile Phones will have same import duties, but ones costing over Rs. 2000 will get more expensive.
34) Cigarettes to get more expensive as import duties increased
35) Homes larger than 2000 sq. ft will attract more taxes
36) Extra Service Tax will be levied on all Air Conditioned restaurants
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