Union Budget 2017-18

Once approved, it will set in motion the process of the biggest overhaul in the budgeting process in 15 years

Advancing of the Budget and notifying of the Finance Act, 2017 has enabled the Centre and state governments to start spending from the first month of the financial year itself out of the Centrally allocated funds. Earlier, mainly expenditures to meeting current liabilities such as salaries and pensions used to be incurred from April and the rest crucial outlays would have to wait till enactment of the Finance Act which used to take place June. By that time monsoon would have arrived and the farmers would have already started sowing. Early release of expenditure, particularly capex, is all the more relevant in the current juncture when the economy is taking time to recover after demonetisation of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes. Economic growth slowed down to 7.1 per cent in 2016-17 compared to 7.9 per cent in the previous year. The economy is not likely to come back to the growth rate clocked in 2015-16 in two years, according to various estimates. As such, the government is ...

The govt will release Rs 20,000 crore to FCI this month to start procurement in Punjab and Haryana

It also said demonetisation will have a positive impact on the gold industry in the long run

We will exceed the budget estimates both in direct tax and indirect tax this year, says FM

Several opposition parties have sought postponement of the budget