Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Shatrughan Sinha on Wednesday said that the Union Budget presented in the Parliament had a major focus on "Hum Do Humare Do" and had nothing special for the people belonging to the middle-class strata.
"The budget was presented keeping in mind the upcoming Lok Sabha elections and there was nothing special mention for the middle-class people. Looking at the budget, it seems as if it has been created to specially care about the 'Hum Do Humare Do' as it is evident from the significantly reduced highest slab for Income Tax payers. People understand it well whom have they done it for," Shatrughan Sinha said.
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, during the Budget session today, announced an increase in the income tax rebate limit from Rs 5 lakh to Rs 7 lakh stating that the new tax regime will now be the default tax regime.
The Finance Minister also proposed to change the tax structure in this regime by reducing the number of tax slabs to 5 and increasing the tax exemption limit to Rs 3 lakh.
On personal income tax, the FM announced that "Tax for income of Rs 0-Rs 3 lakh is nil, for income above Rs 3 lakh and up to Rs 5 lakh will be taxed at 5 per cent, for income of above Rs 6 lakh and up to Rs 9 lakh will be taxed at 10 per cent and for income above Rs 12 lakh and up to Rs 15 lakh to be taxed at 20 per cent and above 15 lakh at Rs 30 per cent."
For pensioners, the finance minister announced extending the benefit of the standard deduction to the new tax regime. Each salaried person with an income of Rs. 15.5 lakh or more will benefit by Rs. 52,500.
The TMC leader further said that the topics of Diesel, Petrol, the common man, women, and farmers have barely been touched. "I believe that a lot more is yet to be studied in the budget," he continued.
"It was expected that during the Amritkaal, many prisoners waiting for bail due to the lack of enough bail amount and other reasons would be freed, but their files are still lying untouched, including the one of Sidhu [Former Punjab Congress Chief Navjot Singh Sidhu]. There is a lot more that needs to be done hence it needs to be studied well," he added.
Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu had surrendered to serve the one-year imprisonment awarded by the Supreme Court in a 1988 road rage death case.
Sidhu was acquitted in connection with the culpable homicide charges but was convicted of the offence of voluntarily causing hurt.
The court had slapped a fine of Rs 1,000 on Sidhu and also acquitted Sidhu's associate, Rupinder Singh Sandhu in the case.
On December 27, 1988, Sidhu allegedly beat Gurnam Singh on his head, leading to his death.
( With inputs from ANI )
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