Budget 2008 Highlights

Banking cash transaction tax withdrawn from April 1, 2009.

Commodities Transaction Tax to be introduced on the lines of Securities Transaction Tax.

Five year tax holiday for promoting cultural tourism.

Five year tax holiday for setting up hospitals in tier II and tier III regions for providing healthcare in rural areas from April 1, 2008.

For women, the income tax limit goes up from Rs 1.45 lakh to Rs 1.80 lakh. In case of senior women citizens, it increases from Rs 1.95 lakh to Rs 2.25 lakh.

Securities Transaction Tax is a deductible expenditure from now on

New tax slabs will be: 10 per cent for Rs 1,50,000 to Rs 3,00,000, 20 per cent for Rs 3,00,000 to Rs 5,00,000 and 30 per cent above Rs 5,00,000.

Short term capital gains tax increased to 15%

Changes in IT slab. Threshold of exemption for all Income Tax assesses raised from from 1,10,000 to 1,50,000.

NO CHANGE IN CORPORATE INCOME TAX, NO CHANGE IN SURCHARGE

General Centvat on all goods to be reduced from 16 per cent to 14 per cent. Excise duty reduced from 16 per cent to eight per cent on all pharmaceutical goods manufacture.

Excise duty on small cars reduced to 12 per cent from 16 per cent and hybrid cars to 14 per cent.

Duty on crude and unrefined sulphur reduced from five to 2 per cent to help raise domestic fertiliser production.

CIGARETTES TO BE TAXED MORE. Duty on non filter cigarettes to be raised.

Tax to GDP ratio increased from 9.2 per cent in 2004-05 to 12.5 per cent 2007-08.

Excise duty on two-wheelers cut from 16% to 12%

Duty withdrawn on naptha for production of polymers.

Special Countervailing Duty on power imports.

No excuse duty on wireless data cards, composting machines. Excise duty reduced from 16 to 8 per cent on water purification items.

Customs duty on specified sports goods machinery down from 7.5 per cent to five per cent.

Customs duty on specified life saving drugs reduced from ten per cent to five per cent.

CUSTOMS DUTIES TO BE REDUCED ON SOME POWER PROJECTS, STEEL MELTING SCRAP, ON SOME LIFE-SAVING DRUGS.

Rs 624 crore allocated for Commonwealth Games.

DEFENCE: Allocation to be increased by 10%

PAN NEEDED FOR ALL MARKET TRANSACTIONS.

GOOD NEWS FOR TEXTILES: Allocation for Textile Upgradation Fund to be more than doubled.

75 lakh people to be covered by health insurance schemes, says FM.

OIL EXPLORATION: Foreign investment of $3.5 billion to $8 billion expected for exploration and development of new oil blocks.

Rs 800 crore for accelerated power reforms programme.

Agricultural loans given by scheduled commercial banks, regional rural banks and cooperative credit institutions up to March 31, 2007 and due for December 31 that year will be covered under the waiver scheme to address the problem of indebtedness.

COMPLETE WAIVER OF ALL LOANS FOR SMALL AND MARGINAL FARMERS.

A target of Rs 2.80 lakh crore for agriculture credit set for the coming year.

Rice production estimiated at 94.08 million tonnes, maize 16.78 mt, soyabean 9.45 mt and cotton 23.38 million bales.

Services and manufacturing sectors expected to grow by 10.7 per cent and 9.4 per cent, says Chidambaram.

Govt will monitor foreign fund inflow, the FM said.

Growth rate of agricultre extimated at 2.6 per cent during the current year.

Agriculture growth was disappointing at 2.6% only, hurting the economy. The rise in global oil prices too has hurt us, say the FM.

Indian economy, like all developing economies, are beinghurt by these global upheavals in prices.

India's growth will be at 8.7% according to the CSO, but FM optimistic India will attain 8.8% growth at least.