Five rice companies rose by 0.16% to 2.52% at 14:08 IST on BSE after finance minister gave some relief in service tax for rice warehousing and storage.
Lakshmi Energy and Foods (up 2.52%), KRBL (up 2.09%), LT Foods (up 0.86%), Usher Agro (up 0.43%) and Chaman Lal Setia Exports (up 0.16%), edged higher.
Kohinoor Foods (down 1.64%) and REI Agro (down 0.19%), edged lower.
The S&P BSE Sensex was up 72.73 points, or 0.36% at 20,439.55.
By virtue of the definition of 'agricultural produce' in Finance Act 2012, read with the Negative List, storage or warehousing of paddy was excluded from the levy of service tax. Rice was not. The distinction is somewhat artificial. Hence, finance minister P. Chidambaram proposed to exempt loading, unloading, packing, storage and warehousing of rice from service tax. The proposal was part of the interim budget announced today, 17 February 2014.
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