Is Govt. Planning to Provide Relief to Taxpayers

Tax-related announcements: By raising the tax exemption amount or the exemption limit, the government can provide relief to individual taxpayers.

On February 1st, Nirmala Sitharaman, the minister of finance, will announce the Union Budget for 2023–24. This is the government's fifth and final complete budget before the general elections of 2024.

Announcements relating to taxes:

Budget statements pertaining to income taxes are among the most closely followed items since they have an impact on both the general populace and the government's exchequer. It is anticipated that by raising the tax exemption or exemption ceiling, the government will be able to help individual taxpayers. There is also a request to enhance the Section 80C deduction threshold from the current Rs 1.5 lakh in the Union Budget 2023–24.

Fiscal deficit

Fiscal deficit is one of the important metrics to follow among the markets and policymakers. This reflects the health of the government’s finances and its dependence on borrowing. As per the new data available, India’s fiscal deficit from April-November 2022 stood at Rs 9.78 lakh crore or 58.9 percent of the target for the entire fiscal year. In the same period last year, the deficit stood at 46.2 percent of the target for the entire FY22. A fiscal deficit is a difference between the expenditure and revenue of the government.

Disinvestment target The budgeted disinvestment target for the current financial year 2022-23 is Rs 65,000 crore. Of this, the government has so far raised about Rs 31,000 crore by selling its equity in central public sector enterprises. In the last four years, the government has been continuously missing the budgetary target.

The disinvestment objective that Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had originally set for the Union Budget 2021–2022 was later reduced to Rs 78,000 crore. The mop-up in 2021–22, however, was only Rs 13,531 billion. The massive LIC IPO in India took place during the most recent fiscal year. Two state-owned banks and a general insurance firm are currently in the process of being privatized.

Capital Expenditure

The most recent budget for 2022 supported capital expenditure to bolster the epidemic-affected economy. Meanwhile, some reports claim that Nirmala Sitharaman, the finance minister, may present a sizable expenditure scheme for private investment for the fiscal year 2023–2024. In the next budget year 2023–24, it is anticipated that the government would stick to its objective to raise capital expenditure, paying particular attention to state capital asset spending.