Finance Minister announces 12 key stimulus measures to boost economy

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman Thursday announced 12 key stimulus measures to boost the economy saying that it is emerging strong amid the Covid-19 pandemic as key parameters of the economy are in the positive trajectory.

She said, these stimulus measures announced under the Atma Nirbhar Bharat 3.0 will provide a boost to employment, agriculture, infrastructure, manufacturing, housing and research and development of Covid-19 vaccine in the country.

Addressing the press briefing in New Delhi on Thursday, the Minister said, these announcements are in line with the earlier stimulus packages which were announced to effectively deal with the effect of Covid-19 pandemic. She said, the size of the stimulus being provided by the government as part of the 12 announcements, amounts to 2 lakh 65 thousand crore rupees. She added that these Atma Nirbhar Bharat stimulus measures cumulatively amounts to 15 per cent of the GDP.

Informing about the state of the economy, Finance Minister said, rise in PMI Index, energy consumption, GST collection, bank credit, FPI investment shows that India’s economy is doing better. She said, market capitalization and forex reserves are at an all time high which is a positive indicator.

Giving the details of the progress made under the AtmaNirbhar Bharat Abhiyan, she said, the measures taken under the Abhiyan resulted in good results. She informed that 28 States and Union Territories have been brought under the national portability of ration cards from the 1st September of this year. She said, portability of ration cards benefitted around 69 crore beneficiaries who can now pick the food grains from any fair price shop in any State. She further informed that more than one lakh 43 thousand crores rupees have been sanctioned to the farmers through Kishan Credit Card. She added that 25 thousand crore rupees have been disbursed for providing capital funding to farmers through NABARD.

Listing out the other key measures, she said, more than one lakh 18 thousand crore rupees worth of loans have been sanctioned to 17 States and Union Territories to increase the liquidity in the Discom sector. She said, a total of 25 thousand crore rupees have been provided as additional capital expenditure to the Ministry of Road Transport and Ministry of Defence. She informed that three thousand 621 crore rupees have been sanctioned to 11 states as interest free loans towards capital expenditure.

Announcing the 12 key stimulus measures, the Finance Minister said, a new scheme Atma Nirbhar Bharat Rozgar Yojana is being launched to incentivise creation of new employment opportunities during the Covid recovery phase. She said, the central government will provide subsidy for two years in respect of new eligible employees after 1st October of this year under the scheme. She said, the subsidy support will be credited upfront in Aadhar seeded EPFO account of eligible new employees.

She further announced that three lakh crore rupees existing emergency credit line guarantee scheme announced as part of the Atma Nirbhar Bharat Abhiyan for the MSME sector has been extended till 31st March of next year. She said, more than two lakh crore rupees have been sanctioned to 61 lakh borrowers so far under the scheme. She added that the scheme will be utilized for 100 per cent collateral free additional credit at capped interest rate to entities in 26 stressed sectors.

Talking about the production linked incentive schemes, she said, the government has approved PLI scheme for three sectors at the cost of more than 51 thousand crore rupees to give a boost to the economy and domestic employment. She informed that yesterday the Union Cabinet chaired by the Prime Minister, Narendra Modi has given its approval to introduce the Production-Linked Incentive Scheme in the 10 key sectors.

Nirmala informed that a number of measures have been taken in the past several months for revival of the housing and real estate sector to provide affordable houses to the people. She said, PM Awaas Yojana-Urban scheme will help in building 12 lakh houses by spending 18 thousand crore rupees. She said, performance security on contracts to be reduced to 3 per cent to support the construction and infrastructure.

She added that income tax relief will be provided to the developers and home buyers to boost the residential housing sector by increasing the differential from 10 per cent to 20 per cent. She said, government will invest six thousand crore rupees equity infusion in NIIF debt platform and provide 65 thousand crore rupees to ensure adequate availability of fertilizers to farmers for the upcoming crop season to fill the gap of increased demand of fertilizers. Informing about the progress made under the PM Garib Kalyan Yojana, she said, further additional outlay of 10 thousand crore rupees will be provided for generation of employment.

She informed that more than 73 thousand crore rupees have been released under MGNREGA and 251 crore person days of employment have been generated so far under the scheme. She announced that three thousand crore rupees will be released to EXIM Bank for promotion of projects through line of credit under IDEAS Scheme. EXIM Bank extends a line of credit on behalf of the government as assistance to developing countries under the scheme. She said, more than 10 thousand crore rupees will be provided as capital and industrial expenditure for promoting domestic defence equipment, industrial infrastructure and green energy sector.

On the Covid-19 pandemic, the Finance Minister said, India effectively dealt with the pandemic which resulted in a decline in the number of active cases and mortality rate. She announced that the government has provided 900 crore rupees for Covid Surkhasha Mission for research and development of India Covid vaccine to the Department of Biotechnology.