2019 Budget Key Highlights

Know All About Budget 2019

Finance minister Piyush Goyal on Friday presented the much-awaited union budget in Lok Sabha. Here are the key highlights of the 2019 budget

Income Tax Relief

• Individual taxpayers with annual income up to 5 Lakhs rupees will get a full tax rebate
• Standard tax deduction of a salaried person increased from 40k to 50k INR.

Tax Exemption on Investments

• Individuals with a total income of Rs. 6.5 Lakhs need not to pay tax if they invest in prescribed equities or provident fund.
• Threshold limit of TDS(u/s 194I) increased for rental income from 1.8 Lakhs to 2.4 Lakhs INR.
• TDS u/s 194A threshold on interest income up to Rs 40,000 in post offices and banks made tax free prior it was Rs. 10,000.
• Capital gains tax exemptions under Section 54 to be available up to Rs 2 Cr. Capital gains exemption to be available on 2 house properties
• Income tax relief on notional rent from unsold houses has been extended to 2 years from 1 year

Other Tax-related Reliefs:

• Income Tax returns to be processed u/s 143(1)within 24 hours
• Within nearly two years, almost all assessment and verification of IT returns will be done electronically by an anonymised tax system without any intervention by officials.
• Direct tax collections has increased from Rs 6.38 Lakh Crore in 2013-14 to almost Rs 12 Lakh Crore; the tax base is also up from Rs 3.79 Crore to 6.85 Crore

Goods and Services Tax (GST)

• Group of Ministers to suggest ways to reduce GST rates for house buyers.
• Businesses with less than Rs 5 Cr. annual turnover, comprising over 90% of GST payers, will be allowed to file quarterly returns.
• Indian Customs to fully digitized export-import transactions and leverage RFID for logistic. Govt. abolishes duties on 36 capital goods.
• GST collections in January 2019, has crossed Rs 1 Lakhs Cr.
• GST has been continuously reduced, resulting in relief of 80,000 Cr. rupees to consumers; most items of daily use for the poor and middle class are now in the 0%-5% tax bracket

Sops for workers

• Rs 3,000 per year pension for unorganized sector workers
• For unorganized sector workers, with income up to Rs 15,000 per month, New Pradhan MantriShram Yogi MaandhanYojana introduced. Beneficiaries will get Rs 3,000 per month pension with a contribution of Rs 100 per month after retirement. Govt allocates Rs 500 Cr. for the scheme
• Gratuity limit increased for workers from Rs. 10 Lakhs to 30 Lakhs

For Farmers

• Under the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme Farmers having up to 2 hectares of lands will get Rs 6,000 per year in three equal installments. The scheme will be effective from December 1, 2018. This scheme will cover more than 12 crore farmers across the country and will cost the government around Rs 75,000 crore.
• Interest subvention for farm loan takers: Farmers affected by natural calamities to get 2% interest subvention and additional 3% interest subvention upon timely repayment .
• 2% interest subvention to farmers who pursue animal husbandry, fisheries jobs through Kisaan credit cards. An additional three percent subsidy will be paid on loans for timely payment.
• Rashtriya Kamdhenu Aayog for animal husbandry enhance the productivity of cows.
• Under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee program’s the allocation has been increased by Rs 5,000 crore to Rs 60,000 crore for FY20
• Rs 19,000 allocated for construction of rural roads under Gram Sadak Yojana.

Defence Budget

• Govt. increases defence budget to over Rs 3.05 Lakhs Cr.. Govt. will provide additional funds for Defense, if needed. Defence budget has crossed the Rs 3 lakh crore figure for the first time.
• We have disbursed 35,000 Cr. rupees under the One Rank One Pension (OROP) scheme in the last few years

Railways

• Railway's operating ratio for-seen 96.2% in FY19 and in the next financial year the aim will be to have it at 95%.
• Railway capex for FY20 set at record Rs 1.6 Lakhs Cr.
• Today there is not a single unmanned railway crossing on the broad gauge in India.

Fiscal Deficit

• For FY19, the government has revised the fiscal deficit target to 3.4 per cent in FY 19. Fiscal deficit for 2019/20 estimated at 3.4 per cent of GDP.
• Government's stated commitment earlier was to bring down the fiscal deficit to 3.1 per cent of GDP by the end of March 2020, and to 3 per cent by March 2021
• Current account deficit at 2.5% of the GDP

Single Window Clearance for Filmmakers

A single window clearance will be made available to filmmakers, anti-camcording provision to also to be introduced in Cinematography Act to fight piracy

Banking Sector

The 4R approach has been implemented to ensure clean banking

1. Recognition
2. Resolution
3. Recapitalization
4. Reforms

Ten Priority Sectors for Government

1. To build next-gen infrastructure - physical as well as social;
2. To build a Digital India that reaches every citizen;
3. Clean and Green India;
4. Expanding rural industrialization using modern industrial technologies;
5. Clean Rivers - with safe drinking water to all Indians;
6. Oceans and coastlines;
7. India becoming launchpad of the world;
8. Self-sufficiency in food and improving agricultural productivity with an emphasis on organic food.
9. Healthy India
10. Minimum Government Maximum Governance, with proactive, responsible and friendly bureaucracy

Social Schemes

• Govt. to build 1 Lakhs digital villages
• For the welfare of farmers and for doubling their income, a historic decision was taken to increase MSP by 1.5 times the production cost for all 22 crops
• To ensure cleaner fuel and health assurance, we embarked upon Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana, program to give 8 Cr. free LPG connections to rural households, 6 Cr. connections have been given already
• The committee under NITI Aayog to be set up for denotified nomadic & semi-nomadic communities

Indian Economy

• India is poised to become a $5 trillion economy in the next 5 years, $10-trillion economy in the next eight years
• Growth in the last 5 years has been higher than that by any other govt. Spent Rs 2.6 Lakhs Cr. in the recap of PSU Banks
• Average inflation in the UPA government was 10% and we have brought that down to 4 per cent. Inflation in December 2018 was 2.1%. If we had not controlled inflation our families would have been spending 35-40 per cent more on daily use items
• Transparent auctioning of natural resources like coal and oil
• Domestic air traffic doubled in the last 5 years
• Over 90 per cent of the country covered under sanitation coverage. People have made this a social revolution and I thank the 130 Cr. people of the country. More than 5.45 Lakhs villages have been declared Open Defecation Free
• In the past, false promises were made but we have taken targeted expenditure on all dimensions
• Everybody will get an electricity connection in the near future. We have provided 143 Cr. electricity bulbs to the poor
• Ayushman Bharat, the world's largest healthcare programme, was launched to provide medical care to almost 50 Cr. people, resulting in Rs 3,000 Cr. savings by poor families
• Lower costs of Stents & Knee implants have benefited people. The government has announced 14 new AIIMS since 2014
• Loans worth Rs 7.23 Lakhs Cr. have been given under Mudra Yojana
• Monthly mobile data consumption has increased 50 times in the last 5 years; the cost of data and voice calls in India is possibly the lowest in the world.

Black Money

• Committed to eliminating the scourge of black money; anti-black money measures taken have brought an undisclosed income of about 1.30 Lakhs Cr. rupees to the fore; 3.38 Lakhs shell companies were deregistered
• The fiscal deficit is seen at 3.4 per cent in FY 19 and Current account deficit at 2.5% of the GDP
• We have recovered Rs 3 Lakhs Cr. through Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code. Govt expects banks on the central bank's Prompt Corrective Action list to be removed soon.