Key highlights of Indian Budget 2018-19: PM Modi praises Arun Jaitley
Prime Minister Narendra Modi praises his finance minister Arun Jaitley for delivering a budget that is "farmer friendly, common citizen friendly, business environment-friendly and development friendly."
Govt's health scheme to cover 10 crore poor families is world's largest government-funded health protection scheme.
Arun Jaitley proposed to tax long term capital gains exceeding Rs 1 lakh at 10 per cent without indexation.
Electronic IT assessment will be rolled out across the country, leading to greater efficiency and transparency: FM
Mobile phones set to become costlier as custom duty on them has been increased to 20 per cent.
Health and education cess has been increased to 4 per cent.
For senior citizens, exemption of interest income on bank deposits raised to Rs 50,000: FM Jaitley
FM Jaitley proposes to introduce tax on distributed income by equity oriented mutual funds at 10 per cent.
Standard deduction of Rs 40,000 for salaried employees in lieu of transport and medical expenses: FM Jaitley
Companies with turnover of up to Rs 250 crore to be taxed at 25 per cent: FM
Arun Jaitley says that the government does not propose any changes in tax slabs for the salaried class this year.
FM proposes a fiscal deficit of 3.3% of GDP for 2018-19.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley proposes revising emoluments as per the following structure:
-- Rs 5 lakh for the President of India
-- Rs 4 lakh for the Vice President
-- Rs 3.5 lakh for the Governors
- Jaitley also proposes automatic revision of emoluments of Parliamentarians every five years, indexed to inflation.
We have already exceeded our disinvestment target, announces Arun Jaitley.
Disinvestment target for 2017-18 has been exceeded and will reach Rs 1 lakh crore. Target for 2018-19 is Rs 80,000 crore.5 lakh WiFi hotspots will be set up in rural areas to provide easy internet access.!