Updated September 27th, 2019 at 11:53 IST

Nirmala Sitharaman to hold a meeting with financial advisors in Delhi

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is all set to meet with secretaries and financial advisors of key selected ministries on Friday in New Delhi

Reported by: Ria Kapoor
| Image:self
Advertisement

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is all set to meet with secretaries and financial advisors of key selected ministries on Friday in New Delhi. The meeting is speculated to have discussions on total CapEx, that refers to capital expenditure that is incurred when a business acquires assets that could be beneficial beyond the current tax year by the ministries in 2019-20. The participants of the meeting will also discuss measures to revive the economy and push up investments.

Meeting after the slash in tax cuts

The meeting comes days after Sitharaman, in a much-appreciated move, announced a reduction in the country’s effective corporate tax rate from around 35 per cent to 25 per cent. For companies that do not avail of any other incentive or commission, the effective tax rate would be just 22 per cent.

READ | FM Nirmala Sitharaman: Economy to start looking up in days ahead

The slash in tax rates was made as a measure to boost the economy. The Finance Minister announced rate cuts in the corporate taxes and let forgo about 1.45L crore to government’s exchequer. The move was received very positively by the public and was called a 'bold move', 'progressive step' and a 'much-needed booster-dose'. 

READ | Piyush Goyal hails Nirmala Sitharaman's decision on corporate tax cuts

The corporate tax was reduced by 10% points to 22% thus making the effective corporate tax around 25.17%. Along with this, Nirmala Sitharaman also provided relief to companies that continue to avail exemptions and incentives by reducing the rate of Minimum Alternate Tax (MAT) from 18.5% to 15%.   

Many reforms have been brought out recently

The government has been introducing one reform after the other to soothe the troubled economy. Sitharaman, apart from tax cuts, had also unveiled another set of reforms to boost the export sector. The government has, in the last few weeks, also introduced a number of measures in various areas like Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), bank mergers and governance reforms, automobile industry, tax and so forth to help the country achieve the target of $5 trillion economy. India’s economy had hit a seven-years lowest slowdown, according to recent government reports.

READ | Anand Mahindra comes to Nirmala Sitharaman's defence, shuts trolls

READ | Nirmala Sitharaman & Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw in Twitter spat over economy

(With ANI Inputs)

Advertisement

Published September 27th, 2019 at 11:25 IST