Minister of State for Finance Jayant Sinha today said that the Union Budget presented in February aimed to rejuvenate the rural economy, focus on fiscal consolidation, reform public sector banks, transform the tax ecosystem, massively increase public investment and upgrade the social security system.
Addressing an interactive session on the Union Budget 2016-17 proposals at FICCI, Sinha said that the Union Budget aims to create a balance between 'Bharat', the informal rural economy and the modern 21st century India.
"The transformation in the tax ecosystem will come by reducing litigation and uncertainty by reducing discretionary power of tax officers, Dispute Resolution Scheme, etc. The Budget simplifies and rationalizes the tax system through a Rs. two crore limit for presumptive taxation scheme, abolishing 13 cesses, time limit of one year for disposing petitions seeking waiver of interest and penalty," added Sinha.
He said that a lot more is needed to be done and added that the government's focus would on execution of the policies and initiatives rolled out by the government.
Much more is to come, he said, such as the GST, the Bankruptcy Code, real estate reform, affordable housing and building of smart cities.
He said that the key features of the budget proposal are to build infrastructure through public investment, a robust financial system, transparent and predictable tax regime, cooperative federalism and governance reforms.
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FICCI president Harshavardhan Neotia observed the fine print of the proposals reveal that the Budget was not just a good one, but a well-thought out exercise.
The reforms measures were far reaching, he said and added that it was gratifying to note that many of the suggestions made by FICCI were incorporated in the Budget.