Budget 2018-19

The Union Finance Minister Sh. Arun Jaitley has presented his last full budget 2018-19 of current government on 1^st February 2018. Here are some of the highlights of the budget which can be useful for RBI Grade B exam:

Table of Contents

Agriculture

Farmers to get a minimum of 50% over their cost of production
The government has decided to fix Minimum Support Price on majority of rabi crops at 1.5 times the cost of production
Development and Up gradation of 22000 rural haats into Gramin Agricultural Markets (GraMs) to help 86% of farmers and access market facilities.
Kisan Credit Cards to Fisheries and Animal Husbandry Farmers.
Agri-Market Infra Fund of Rs 2000 crore for GraMs/Rural Haats and 585 e-NAM centres
Encouragement will be provided to Farmers Producer Organisations and Village Producer Organisations in large clusters.
Operations Greens launched to address price fluctuations in Tomato, Onion and Potato for the benefit of Farmers and Consumers
Allocation doubled for food procession industries.
Liberalization of agricultural commodities exports
Re-structured National Bamboo Mission with allocations of Rs 1290 crore
Allocation of Rs 10000 crore for the joint animal husbandry and fisheries & aquaculture
Higher allocation of Rs 11 lakh crore of credit to be provided to agriculture
Mechanism to be brought in for purchase of surplus power from solar water pumps
Setting up of Fisheries and Aquaculture Infrastructure Development Fund (FAIDF) for fisheries sector and Animal Husbandry Infra Development fund for animal husbandry (AHIDF)
National livelihood scheme gets Rs 5,750 crore

Digital

Allocation to Digital India scheme doubled to Rs 3073 cr
5 lakh WiFi HotSpots to provide Broadband access to 5 crore rural citizens, at the cost of Rs 10,000 cr
Government will take measures to stop cryptocurrency circulation, as it is not considered legal tender
Government will explore the usage of Blockchain technology

Infrastructure

To construct a tunnel under Sela Pass
Ten prominent tourist sites to be developed into Iconic tourism destination
Tourist amenities at 100 Adarsh monuments to be upgraded
To raise equity from market for infrastructure by NHAI
NHAI to use innovative monetizing structures like Toll, Operate, Transfer (TOT) and Infrastructure Investment funds (InvITs)
To expand airport capacity more than 5 times under NABH Nirman to handle a billion trips a year
Introduction of toll system on “pay as you use”
Infrastructure expenditure gets a boost from Rs 4.94 lakh crore to Rs 5.97 lakh crore
Out of 100 smart cities 99 cities have been selected, with an outlay of Rs 2.04 lakh crore

Education

Quality of education to be improved treated education holistically from pre-nursery to class 12
13 lakh untrained teachers to be trained
‘Black Board’ to ‘Digital Board’ technology enabled quality education
Ekalavya Model Residential Schools in all tribal blocks by 2022
Revitalizing Infrastructure and System in Education (RISE) with an investment of Rs 1 lakh crore in 4 years
Set up a specialized railway university in Vadodara
Setting up of two new Schools of Planning and Architecture (SPA)
18 news SPAs to be established in IITs and NITs
Prime Minister’s Research Fellows (PMRF) to promote 1000 B.Tech students doing Ph.D in IIT and IISc

Health

Under Ayushman Bharat Initiative, Comprehensive Health Care through 1.5 lakh wellness centres. They will also provide Non Communicable Diseases and Mother & Child Health services along with free essential drugs and diagnostics services
National Health Protection Scheme to cover 10 crore poor and vulnerable families. The coverage upto Rs 5. Lakh per family for secondary and tertiary care hospitalization
Nutritional support to all TB Patients
24 new government medical colleges and hospitals to be set up by upgrading existing district hospitals. To ensure one medical college for every three parliamentary constituencies.
Rs 600 crore allocated for tuberculosis patients, at the rate Rs 500 per month during the course of their treatment

MSME

To ease cash flow challenges, a Trade Electronic Receivable discounting System (TReDs) introduced
Government to contribute 12% EPF of the wages of new employees in EPF for all sectors in the next three years
10 lakh formal jobs to be created this year
Increased allocation of Rs 7148 crore for textile sector
Rs 3 lakh crore target has been set for the Mudra Yojana

Swacch Bharat

GOBAR DHAN – Galvanizing Organic Bio-Agro Resources Dhan, for management and conversion of cattle dung and solid waste in farms to compost, fertilizer, bio-gas and bio-CNG.

Public Service Delivery

Two defence industrial production corridors to be developed
Industry friendly defence production policy to promote domestic production
Restructuring of Food Corporation of India
Every Industrial enterprise to get unique ID
National Logistics Portal to be developed as a single window online marketplace
Three public sector general insurance companies to be merged as single entity

Economy & Financial Markets

‘A’ grade ratings to be eligible for investment
Fiscal Deficit to be kept at 3.3% in 2018-19
Central government debt to GDP ratio to be brought down to 40%
Loans to Women Self Help Groups will increase to Rs.75,000 crore in 2019 from 42,500 crore last year.
Government revises divestment target for the current fiscal to Rs 1 lakh crore for FY 18

Housing for All

Affordable housing fund to be established in National Housing Bank
Housing to all the poor by 2022
Housing target fixed for more than 1 crore houses in rural and 37 lakh houses in urban areas
Target of providing electricity connection to 4 crore houses under Saubhagya Scheme

Taxation

Standard deduction reintroduced upto Rs 40000 for salaried class
Exemption of interest on deposits raised to Rs 50000 from Rs 10000 for senior citizens
Increase in deduction of health insurance premium to Rs 50000 from Rs 30000 for senior citizens
100% income tax deduction of profit to Farm Producer Companies having turnover upto Rs 100 crore for period of 5 years
Reduced tax rate for companies to 25% for those having gross receipt up to 250 crore
Relaxation in the minimum period of employment for Footwear and Leather industries to facilitate trade
The Alternate Minimum Tax (AMT) payable by non-corporate entities operating in International Finance Service Centre (GIFT City) to be reduced to 9%
Introduction of “risk based selection” for verifying self-assessment under Customs Act
Appointing a new Customs Advance Ruling Authority with Appellate mechanism
To control cash economy, payments exceeding Rs 10,000 in cash made by trusts and institutions to be disallowed and would be subject to tax
Tax on Long Term Capital Gains exceeding Rs 1 lakh at the rate of 10%, without allowing any indexation benefit. However, all gains up to 31st January, 2018 will be grandfathered.
Proposal to introduce tax on distributed income by equity oriented mutual funds at the rate of 10%.
Proposal to increase cess on personal income tax and corporation tax to 4% from present 3%

Railways

18000 kms of doubling, third and fourth line works and 5000 kms gauge conversion for capacity creation
To achieve optimal electrification of railway network, 4000 kms are targeted
‘Safety First Policy’ to cover maintenance of track infrastructure and 3600 kms of track renewal.
Redevelopment of 600 major railway stations to be taken up
Elimination of 4267 unmanned level crossings in next two years
All stations with more than 25000 footfall to have escalators
CCTVs to be provided at all stations and on trains to enhance security of passengers
Mumbai transport system expanded by adding 90 kms of double line track and 150 kms of additional suburban network
Bengaluru to get a suburban network of 160 kms at an estimated cost of Rs 17000 crore

Miscellaneous

NITI Aayog to initiate a national programme on Artificial Intelligence (AI) and centres of excellence will be set up on robotics, AI, Internet of things etc.
Comprehensive Gold Policy on the anvil to develop yellow metal as an asset class.
Proposed to extend Pradhan Mantri Vaya Vandana Yojana up to March, 2020
Defence outlay raised to Rs 2.82 lakh crore in 2018-19 from Rs 2.67 lakh crore in current year
Emoluments for President set at Rs 5 lakh, Rs 4 lakh for Vice President, Rs 3.5 lakh for governors
Government earmarks Rs 150 cr to commemorate 150 years of birth of Mahatma Gandhi

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