Budget 2010

[ajay jagga]

The inflationary budget presented by the Finance Minister has rocked and shocked the nation, as with the immediate hike in fuel prices is certainly going to put fuel on the fire and will have a cascading effect on prices of almost all goods as transportation costs will rise. The backlash of the “aam aadmi” is inevitable. The FM has widened the tax slabs, but has not enhanced the exempted limit of Rs. 1.6 lac, which will effect only those, whose income is above Rs. 3 pac per annum, but overall it is just like a coat of sugar on the bitter bill. By any standards it can not be termed as an ideal budget. The benefit of the income tax is not going to affect more than 1% population ie low salary class and low income group because the income tax assessees are less than 4% of the population and most of them are below the income Rs. 2,5 lac, on whom the impact of tax concessions is nil. The budget has nothing to arrest or control the price rise and inflation and the inflationary trends will continue and will have the devastating effect on the aam aadmi. The visible effect of relief of income tax will be wiped out by the indirect taxes like excise duties, as they have been hiked. So it is like putting in one pocket and pulling out more from the other pocket, because the net revenue loss in income tax is of Rs. 26,000 crore and net revenue gain from excise is of 46,500 crore, so the ultimate loss to the people is of Rs. 20,500 crores . The only sweet factor in the budget is for the tiny tots as the toy balloons will become cheaper as they have been fully exempted from central excise duty. Hence the smile is only for the tiny tots due to cheaper toy balloons but not for the parents.