The country is now moving towards developing India. The union finance minister has said that we will become a developed country by 2047. A record is being recorded in the GST collection every year. The income from it is spent on development work in the country. This will definitely benefit the market in the country. This brought happiness but once again issues like domestic trade policy, pension to senior traders were neglected in the budget. This budget can be called 'a little happy, a little sad' budget.
--Sanjay Kankaria, president, Jilha Vyapari Mahasangh
Disappointing for farmers, agriculture industry
Central government got double or triple income from GST. However, no concrete stand was taken to reduce the GST on seeds, fertilizers, herbs and tools required by the farmers. The prices of soybeans and cotton are the same as they were 10 years ago. However, the prices of seeds, medicines, fertilizers have increased. At present GST is 18 percent on pesticides, 12 percent on seed, and 12 to 18 percent on agriculture tools. Considering the elections, no concessions or incentives were given to the farmers and the agriculture industry. The budget is disappointing.
-- Jagannath Kale, general secretary, Marathwada Chamber of Trade and Commerce
There was no need to reduce corporate tax
Corporate tax were reduced from 25 percent to 22 percent. This will definitely benefit the entrepreneurs. But even so, corporate companies are profitable. We would have welcomed it if concessions were given to the small entrepreneurs or small traders. It is a very old demand of ours that traders are depositing tax in various ways and paying it to the government treasury. In return, the government should give them pension after 60 years but this too was ignored.
--Shiv Shankar Swami, general secretary, Jilha Vyapari Mahasangh