Finance Minister Arun Jaitley announced two new measures to provide relief to small taxpayers in Budget 2016.
1) Mr Jaitley raised the deduction limit under Section 87A of the Income Tax Act from Rs. 2,000 to Rs. 5,000 per annum. Under Section 87A, taxpayers first reduce Rs. 2,000 from their total tax payable. This section applies to those with total income of less than Rs. 5 lakh.
Mr Jaitley said the move will help more than 2 crore taxpayers.
2) The finance minister also announced relief for taxpayers who do not own a house and don’t get house rent allowance from employers. So far, such taxpayers got a relief of Rs. 24,000 per year, which has now been raised to Rs. 60,000 per annum, Mr Jaitley said. The measure will provide “relief to those in rented houses”, the finance minister added.
3) Mr Jaitley also announced an additional deduction of Rs. 50,000 on interest paid by first-time home buyers on home loans of up to Rs. 35 lakh, provided the house value doesn’t exceed Rs. 50 lakh.
Here are the Highlight of the Budget 2016:
12.41 p.m.: Finance Minister Arun Jaitley tables the Union Budget 2016 and the Finance Bill.
12.40 p.m.: Rs. 1,060 crore revenue loss through direct tax proposals.
12.39 p.m.: 13 different cesses levied by various ministries with collections less than Rs.50 crore a year to be done away with.
12.38 p.m.: No Service Tax for houses built under 60 square metres.
12.35 p.m.: Excise duty on tobacco increased by 10-15 per cent.
12.29 p.m.: 4% high capacity tax for SUVs.
12.28 p.m.: Limited compliance window for domestic tax payers who have undeclared income.
12.26 p.m.: No changes have been made to existing income tax slabs.
12.25 p.m.: Infrastructure cess to be levied.
12.23 p.m.: 1 per cent service charge on purchase of luxury cars over Rs. 10 lakh and in-cash purchase of goods and services over Rs. 2 lakh.
12.22 p.m.: Additional exemption of Rs. 50,000 for housing loans up to Rs. 35 lakh, provided cost of house is not above Rs. 50 lakh.
12.20 p.m.: 40% of withdrawal at the time of retirement under National Pension Scheme to be tax exempt.
12.19 p.m.: Tax holiday for startups for three of five years of setting up the company
12.13 p.m.: Lowering of Corporate IT rate for companies not exceeding Rs. 5 crore turnover to 25% plus surcharge.
12.09 p.m.: Ceiling under 87A to be increased to Rs. 3,000. HRA deduction up from Rs. 24,000 to Rs. 60,000 p.a.
12.09 p.m.: Ceiling under 87A to be increased to Rs. 3,000.
12.08 p.m.: Rs. 100 crore for Deendayal Upadhyay’s birthday celebrations and Guru Gobind Singh 300th birth anniversary.
12.07 p.m.: Classification of expenditure as plan and non-plan to be done away with.
12.06 p.m.: FIscal deficit at 3.5% of GDP in 2016-17.
12.04 p.m.: A bill on targeted delivery of financial services using Aadhar to be introduced.
12.03 p.m.: Amendment to the Companies Act to ensure speedy registration and boost start-ups.
12.02 p.m.: Rs. 900 crore for buffer stock of pulses.
12.01 p.m.: Dept of Disinvestment renamed as Dept of Investment and Public Asset Management.
12 noon: Direct Benefit Transfer for fertilisers.
11.59 a.m.: EPF at 8.3 per cent for new employees joining the scheme.
11.58 a.m.: Rs. 25,000 crore for recapitalisation of public sector banks. General insurance companies owned by the govt to be listed in stock exchanges.
11.56 a.m.: Amendmends to boost Asset Reconstruction Companies to manage NPAs of public sector banks.
11.55 a.m.: RBI Act to be amended to st up monetary policy committee.
11:53 a.m.: 100% FDI through FAPB route in marketing of food products produced and manufactured in India.
11.47 a.m.: In the power sector, the govt is drawing up a plan for 15-20 years to augment investment in nuclear power. Rs. 3,000 crore per annum for this.
11.45 a.m.: There are 160 airports and airstrips which can be revived.
11.44 a.m.: Motor Vehicles Act to be amended to enable entrepreneurship in the road transport sector.
11.43 a.m.: Total outlay for infrastructure is at Rs. 2.31 lakh crore.
11.42 a.m.: Rs. 97,000 crore for all roads. Total outlay on roads and rails will be Rs. 2.80 lakh crore.
11.41 a.m.: More than 70,000 road projects were languishing at the beginning of the year. Nearly 85% of these projects have been put back on track.
11.39 a.m.: Small shops should be given the choice to remain open on all 7 days a week
11.37 a.m.: Rs. 1,700 crore for 1500 multi-skill development centres.
11.35 a.m.: 10 public and 10 private educational institutions to be made world-class.
11.34 a.m.: Hub to support SC/ST entrpreneurs.
11:34 am Scheme for skill development among minorities, says Finance Minister.
11:33 am Propose to start a national dialysis programme across all district hospitals, certain part of dialysis equipments to get exemption, says Jaitley.
11:31 am Quality medicines to be made available at nominal price, says Jaitley.
11:31 am Six crore additional households to be covered under Digital Literacy scheme in next three years, says the Finance Minister.
11.30 a.m.: Government to provide health insurance of upto Rs. 1 lakh per family. 3,000 stores to be opened for generic drugs.
11.30 a.m.: Total rural sector allocation Rs. 87,769 crore.
11:29 am Rs 2000 crore to meet initial cost of providing LPG connections to households in BPL category, says Jaitley.
11.27 a.m.: Two schemes for digital literacy for rural India and
11.26 a.m.: Rs. 9,000 crore for Swachch Bharat Abhiyan.
11.25 a.m.: 5,542 villages have been electrified, more than the last three years combined.
11.24 a.m.: Rs. 38,500 crore for MNREGA. Highest ever for the rural employment scheme.
11.23 a.m.: Rs. 2.87 lakh crore for gram panchayats as per recommendation of 14th finance commission.
11.22 a.m.: Four schemes for animal welfare.
11.19 a.m.: Agricultural credit target of Rs 9 lakh crore.
11.19 a.m.: Unified e-platform for farmers to be inaugurated on Ambedkar’s birthday.
11.17 a.m.: Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana to bring 5 lakh acres under organic farming.
11.14 a.m.: 28.5 lakh hectares to be brought under irrigation.
11.13 a.m.: Govt will reorganise agricultural policy to double farmer income in five years.
11.11 a.m.: Jaitley announces the nine pillars of his Budget — Agriculture and farmers’ welfare, rural sector, social sector including healthcare, education, skills and job creation, infrastructure, financial sector reforms, ease of doing business, fiscal discipline, tax reforms to reduce compliance burden.
11.11 a.m.: New scheme for BPL families for gas connections. Staturtory backing for Aadhaar platform to ensure delivery of benefits.
11.10 a.m.: CAD is 1.4% of GDP.
11.10 a.m.: FY 16-17 will have the additional burden of implementing the VII pay commission and the defence OROP.
11.08 a.m.: FY 15-16 and 16-17 will be challenging for the government.
11.07 a.m.: Forex reserves are at the highest ever levels — $350 billion.
11.05 a.m.: GDP growth has accelerated to 7.6%. CPI inflation has come down to 5.4%.
11.05 a.m.: Mr. Jaitley says the Indian economy has held strong despite a global slowdown.
11 a.m.: Arun Jaitley rises to present the Budget.
10:46 am: Mr. Jaitley’s Budget speech to begin in 15 minutes.
10:43 am: Union Cabinet clears General Budget for 2016-17.
10:29 am: Cabinet meeting in Parliament ends.
10:05 am: The Sensex falls 59 points in early trade on reduced bets by cautious retail investors amid continued capital outflows by foreign funds ahead of the Budget.
9:53 am: Pre-Budget Cabinet meet to begin shortly.
9:40 am: Mr. Jaitley, MoS Jayant Sinha arrive in Parliament.
And it begins! The Budget papers arrive in Parliament
9:19 am: The stock markets don’t seem very enthused ahead of the Budget — Sensex opens 38.86 points lower, currently at 23,115.44.
9:10 am: The Budget may be given a dash of green with many environment-friendly measures to reduce the carbon footprint, official sources tell media. The budget is likely to provide incentives to encourage local manufacture and Research & Development (R&D) of electric vehicle components, including lithium-iron batteries.
9:00 am: About 8.5 crore employees whose retirement savings are managed by the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) could get an option to transfer over a third of their EPF contributions to the National Pension System, regulated by the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority or PFRDA.
8:54 am: How well do you know your budget history? Here are 11 landmark Union Budgets that you should know about.
8:45 am: Here’s a ready reckoner for some of the terms that will be a part of Mr. Jaitley’s long speech, that some of us may not be familiar with.
8:30 am: How long will this year’s Budget speech be? Which Finance Minister holds the dubious honour of presenting the longest budget speech, in terms of word count? Here’s a clue: it was an 18,650-word speech given 25 years ago!
8:00 am: Budgets are about numbers and best understood using charts and graphics. In case you missed it, here are the highlights of the previous Budget, captured in eight interactive charts.
7:30 am: The event provides us an opportunity to reflect on the proposals and promises that were made during last year’s Budget. We looked at some of them and checked the status of their implementation. Here’s what we found.
7:00 am: Here’s some interesting information. For Budget 2016-17, the government invited suggestions from citizens through Twitter for the first time, even conducting a series of polls to gauge public priorities and expectations from the Budget.
