Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman unveils roadmap for ‘Viksit Bharat’

New Delhi: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented her seventh consecutive budget and her first under Modi 3.0. She highlighted nine priority areas to create adequate opportunities for all.

She also said that these nine priorities of the Union Budget 2024 will form the basis for future budgets of the Modi government.

The nine priority areas are: agricultural productivity and resilience; employment and skills; enhancing human resources; social justice; manufacturing and services; urban development; energy security; infrastructure; innovation; research and development; and next-generation reforms.

Education, job creation, employment, training, SMEs and the middle class are among the key focus areas of this budget.

A roadmap was also presented for implementing the Prime Minister’s package of five programmes for employment, training and other opportunities for 4.1 crore youth over a period of five years, with a central outlay of Rs 2 lakh crore.

This year, an amount of Rs 1.48 lakh crore has been made available for education, employment and training.

Below are the key focus areas and priorities as outlined in Finance Minister Sitharaman’s budget speech:

Priority 1: Agricultural Productivity and Resilience. A provision of Rs 1.52 lakh crore for agriculture and allied sectors; new 109 high-yielding and climate-resilient varieties of 32 arable and horticultural crops for cultivation by farmers; one crore farmers to be initiated into natural farming in the next two years; 10,000 need-based bio-input resource centres to be set up; large-scale clusters for vegetable production to be developed closer to major consumption centres; the government to facilitate implementation of Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) in agriculture for coverage of farmers and their land in three years.

Priority 2: Employment; Skills. The government will implement employment-related incentive schemes as part of the Prime Minister’s package. Scheme A: Freshers. This scheme will provide one month’s salary to all persons new to the workforce across all formal sectors. The direct disbursement of one month’s salary in three instalments to first-time workers, as registered in the EPFO, will be up to Rs 15,000. The eligibility limit will be a salary of Rs 1 lakh per month. The scheme is expected to benefit 2.10 crore youth.

Scheme B: Manufacturing Job Creation. This scheme will stimulate additional manufacturing employment linked to the employment of entry-level workers.

An incentive is provided directly to the employee and the employer on a fixed scale in respect of their EPFO ​​contribution in the first four years of employment.

The scheme is expected to benefit 30 lakh youth entering the labour market and their employers.

Scheme C: Support for Employers. This employer-oriented scheme will cover additional employment across all sectors. All additional employment within a salary range of Rs 1 lakh per month will be taken into account. The government will reimburse employers up to Rs 3,000 per month for their EPFO ​​contribution for two years for each additional employee.

The programme is expected to generate additional employment for 50 lakh people. Over 20 lakh youth will be trained over a period of five years. For skill development in collaboration with state governments and industry, 1,000 industrial training institutes will be upgraded into hub-and-spoke arrangements with outcome orientation.

The government will launch a comprehensive programme to provide internship opportunities in 500 top companies to one crore youth in five years. Interns will get 12 months of exposure to real business environment, different professions and employment opportunities.

An internship allowance of Rs 5,000 per month is provided, plus one-time support of Rs 6,000.

The Model Skill Loan Scheme will be revised to facilitate loans up to Rs 7.5 lakh with a guarantee from a government-sponsored fund. This measure is expected to help 25,000 students per year. To help youth who have not benefited from government initiatives, financial assistance is planned for loans up to Rs 10 lakh for higher education in domestic institutions. E-vouchers for this purpose will be given directly to one lakh students every year for an annual interest subsidy of three per cent of the loan amount.

Priority 3: Inclusive human resource development and social justice. States in the eastern part of the country are rich in endowments and have strong cultural traditions. The government will formulate a plan, Purvodaya, for the overall development of the eastern region of the country, which includes Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Odisha and Andhra Pradesh. The government will also support the development of road connectivity projects, namely (1) the Patna-Purnea Expressway, (2) the Buxar-Bhagalpur Expressway, (3) the Bodh Gaya, Rajgir, Vaishali and Darbhanga rail tracks, and (4) an additional two-lane bridge over the Ganga river at Buxar at a total cost of Rs 26,000 crore.

Power projects, including construction of a new 2,400 MW power plant at Pirpainti, will be executed at a cost of Rs 21,400 crore.

New airports, medical colleges and sports infrastructure are being built in Bihar.

Recognizing Andhra Pradesh’s need for capital, the government will facilitate special financial support through multilateral development agencies. In the current fiscal, Rs 15,000 crore will be provided.

Three crore additional houses have been announced under the Prime Minister Awas Yojana in rural and urban areas of the country, for which necessary allocations are being made.

To promote women-led development, the Budget has allocated over Rs 300,000 crore for programmes benefiting women and girls.

In order to improve the socio-economic condition of tribal communities, the government will launch the PM Janjatiya Unnat Gram Abhiyan by adopting saturation coverage in tribal majority villages and aspiration districts. This will cover 63,000 villages, benefiting five crore tribal people.

Over 100 branches of India Post Payment Bank are being set up in the North East region to expand banking services. This year, a provision of Rs 2.66 lakh crore has been made for rural development, including rural infrastructure.

Priority 4: Manufacturing and Services. To facilitate term loans to MSMEs for purchase of machinery and equipment without collateral or third party guarantee, a credit guarantee scheme will be introduced which will work on pooling of credit risks of such MSMEs. A separately constituted self-financing guarantee fund will provide each applicant with a guarantee cover of up to Rs 100 crore.

The limit for Mudra loans will be increased from Rs 10 lakh to Rs 20 lakh for entrepreneurs who have previously taken loans under the ‘Tarun’ category and successfully repaid them.

In order to facilitate SMEs to free up their working capital by converting their trade receivables into cash, the turnover threshold of buyers for mandatory onboarding on the TReDS platform has been reduced from Rs 500 crore to Rs 250 crore.

The government will facilitate the development of investment-ready ‘plug and play’ industrial estates with complete infrastructure in or near 100 cities.

A maximum of 12 industrial estates will also be approved under the National Industrial Corridor Development Programme.

Priority 5: Urban Development. The government will facilitate the development of ‘Cities as Growth Hubs’. This will be achieved through economic and transit planning and the orderly development of peri-urban areas using urban planning schemes.

Public transport development plans are being drawn up for 14 major cities with over 30 lakh population.

Under PM Awas Yojana Urban 2.0, the housing needs of one crore urban poor and middle class families will be addressed with an investment of Rs 10 lakh crore. This will include Central assistance of Rs 2.2 lakh crore over the next five years.

There is also consideration of providing interest rate subsidies to facilitate borrowing at affordable rates.

Priority 6: Energy Security Nuclear energy is expected to be a very important part of the energy mix for Viksit Bharat. To achieve this goal, the government will collaborate with the private sector to set up Bharat Small Reactors, research and development (R&D) of Bharat Small Modular Reactors and R&D of newer nuclear energy technologies.

The R&D funding announced in the interim budget will be made available for this sector.

A joint venture between NTPC and BHEL will set up a full-scale commercial plant of 800 MW using AUSC technology. The government will provide the required financial support.

Priority 7: Infrastructure Phase IV of PMGSY is being launched to provide all-weather connectivity to 25,000 rural areas identified due to population growth.

This year, a sum of Rs 1.5 lakh crore has been made available for long-term interest-free loans to support states in allocating their resources.

Priority 8: Innovation and R&D. The government will operationalize the Anusandhan National Research Fund for basic research and prototype development.

Further, the government will set up a mechanism to incentivise private sector-led research and innovation at commercial scale with a funding pool of Rs 100,000 crore, in line with the announcement in the interim budget.

As we continue to focus on growing the space economy five-fold in the next 10 years, a venture capital fund of Rs 1,000 crore is being set up.

Priority 9: Next Generation Reforms. States are encouraged to implement land reforms and actions within the next three years through appropriate financial support. Land reforms and actions in rural areas to cover land management and planning. In urban areas it will cover town planning, land use and building regulations. Rural land actions include ULPIN or Bhu-Aadhaar for all lands, digitisation of cadastral maps, survey of map subdivisions based on current ownership, establishment of land registry and linkage to farmers’ register.

These actions will facilitate the flow of credit and other agricultural services. Land records in urban areas will be digitized with GIS mapping. An IT-based system for property registration and tax administration will be set up. It will improve the financial position of urban local bodies. (IANS)

Also read: Manipur: Criticism follows omission of relief for floods, displaced people in Manipur in Union Budget (sentinelassam.com)