New Delhi: India’s Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will be presenting the Union Budget today at a time when the country’s economy is recovering from the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Siharaman declared that the budget will be a budget like never before as the times have been quite competitive amidst coronavirus and expectations are high.
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The Budget session will begin with Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman delivering a speech which will take place at around 11 am. Before that, the Union Cabinet will hold a meeting at 10:15 am.
For the first time, Union Budget will be presented in paperless form.
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Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is likely to announce measures to put more money in the hands of taxpayers, in a continuation of the previous move that gave a choice between 25 per cent without claims and 30 per cent with claims income tax slabs.
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Today's budget will have to go far beyond what the mini-budget in September 2019 achieved by reducing corporate tax, and the subsequent economy-booster announcements during the lockdown necessitated by the pandemic. The budget will come as an economic vaccine for the pandemic-battered economy and steer India with the much-needed stimulus to boost demand, consumer confidence and at the same time boost purchasing power of people, the Indian Chamber of Commerce said. One of the closely watched aspects of the budget, apart from corporate and income taxes, will be the expenditure on COVID-19 vaccination in fiscal 2022.
