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| Surfers' comments |
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The threshold limits on tax need to be increased and tax rates should be spread across more slabs so as not to hurt the salaried class.
- Jayaraman
The I-T exemption for men should be Rs 1.8 lakh. Rs 1.5 lakh is peanuts. - Naveen Kumar |
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| Expert comments |
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 Gaurav Taneja,
Partner & National Tax Director says the Finance Minister has stressed on buoyancy in tax collections and on attaining a Tax—GDP ratio of 12.5%. |
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 Motilal Oswal, Chairman and Managing Director of Motilal Oswal Financial Services says the Finance Minister was uniquely positioned to present a landmark Budget. |
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 Srinivasa Rao, Partner & India International Tax Leader, Ernst & Young is of the opinion that Union Budget has lived up to the populist trend. |
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| Calculators |
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| Union Budget 2008-09 » Story |
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| Rural infrastructure spending raised to Rs 140 bn |
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| Indo-Asian News Service |
| New Delhi, February 29, 2008 |
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The rural infrastructure spending has been raised to Rs 140 billion ($3.5 billion) in the 2008-09 budget to support development projects in the rural areas.
In his fifth straight budget speech, Finance Minister P. Chidambaram has said: "The Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF) is the main instrument to channalise bank funds for financing rural infrastructure, and it is quite popular among state governments. Therefore, I propose to raise the corpus of RIDF-XIV in 2008-09 to Rs 140 billion."
The budget also proposed to operate a separate window under RIDF for developing rural roads with a corpus of Rs 40 billion.
Besides, the government has proposed to create a Rs 12 billion fund in the National Housing Bank to enhance its re-finance operations in the rural housing sector.
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| Features |
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A budget for Bharat
Buoyant tax revenues a lower fiscal deficit and an economy that's in top gear permit the FM to pump big money into agriculture and the social sector. Those efforts might help at the hustings, too. |
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| Economic Survey |
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'Expand telecom infrastructure, R&D'
"With rapid growth of telecom network, there is a need to further expand the infrastructure and research and development," the survey said. |
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| Surfers' comments |
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This is a very good budget, especially for agriculture and education. P Chidambaram is the best.
- By Saravanan P (plsharavanan@rediffmail.com) |
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If you can waive Rs 50,000 crore for farmers what about the tax on housing loan interest? That should also have been reduced.
- Chandra Shekar V (rilshekar@yahoo.co.in) |
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Please tax the street hawkers and give relief to the salaried persons.
- Rajaram (rajaramghurup@rediffmail.com) |
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This is the worst budget the finance minister has ever presented. The backbone of the country's economy is the transport but he completely missed it out.
- Jayakaanthan A (jayakaanthan@gmail.com) |
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The budget is sure to augment growth and will also lessen the volatility of the stock markets.
- Sidharth Paul (sidharth.paul@gmail.com) |
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Overall, the budget is satisfactory but the health sector should have been given greater importance.
- Ankit Chaudhary (chaudharyankit1987@gmail.com) |
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| Send your feedback |
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"Total reduction of excise duties by 2% will give a welcome boost to the manufacturing sector. Also, the exemption of specified parts of set-top boxes from customs duties is commendable".
