B.N.Bharath, Chief Manager, Specialised Mid Corporate Branch, SBI, Bengaluru

1. Food inflation is rising unabated. Though the Dearness Allowance payable to the salaried class keeps revised from time to time, it offsets the price rise to a limited extent only. Moreover, the commodities and various food items are already taxed by way of VAT, excise, slaes tax etc. The dearness allowance is taxed at the hands of the individual tax payers treating it as income, which in reality is not. Therefore it is nothing but double taxation. Hence, it is suggested that this element of DA, is to be made tax free. 2. Banks provide impetus to the overall economic development of the nation. It is imperative to encourage bank deposits. Interest income upto say, Rs.1 lac p.a., can be made tax free, so that people channelise their savings to this legal route rather than falling prey blade companies, uncertain stock market etc. 3. During the last 2-3 years financial meltdown took place in US, Europe etc. But India, was relatively, less affected, thanks to the high savings rate. It is time the finance minister encourages savings by individual tax payers. Investment in infrastructure and development related savings instruments is to be encouraged. 4. Salaried class are the prompt tax payers and most of the times end up paying over 30% of their monthly income as tax. To provide solace to them, Standard Deduction should be brought back just as the benefit of depreciation is available to business segment. 5. Government should encourage corporate, institutions to plant saplings in a big way going for something like corporate forests, to check global warming thereby protecting the environment. The encouragement can be in the form of sort of tax concession as in case of wind energy etc.

Dr. K. U. Mada, Director, Economist and Company, Mumbai

TUNING IN PERSONAL TAXATION TO INFLATION
The Budget should tune in personal taxation in the context of raging inflation and the need for sustaining saving in the economy. Inflation essentially inflicts injury to the middle class, salaried class and middle level tax-paying individuals. One of the ways in the Indian Budgets, except for the last decade or so, is the too-frequent- change of tax rates, direct and indirect. FM should, as far as possible, avoid tinkering with changes in the rates to ensure that there is an element of stability injected into the system to facilitate planning by individuals, corporates and the rest.
The exemption limits of individuals, senior citizens and women should be raised by Rs. 20,000per year. The exemptions in recent years have been far from adequate to take care of inflationary pressures. Further, there is an immediate need to raise the 80C limit from Rs. 1 lakh to higher levels on a graduated basis. For income beyond Rs.10 lakhs, the exemption could remain at Rs.1 lakh, above Rs.20 lakhs at Rs.1.5 lakhs, above Rs.30 lakhs at Rs.2 lakhs, above Rs.40 lakhs at Rs.2.5 lakhs and above Rs.50 lakhs at Rs.3 lakhs. This would ensure a degree of equity and fairness. Also, obligations to family, community and society go higher with higher income. Having a uniform Rs.1 lakh which in the present inflationary context is far from adequate. The higher the income the higher should be the exemption limit. As one of the canons of taxation enjoins, it is a reward for earning more and paying tax.
In addition, infrastructure development is in focus and its core role in the next two decades of the Indian growth story is obvious and well-recognised. If the Government is serious about mobilizing funds through infrastructure companies, the higher amounts of investments in infrastructure bonds should be encouraged. Moreover, the entities concerned have got to meet fund-raising expenditures and the funds so raised should be a substantial part of their resources for being deployed in the infrastructure projects. As of now, the exemption limit under Section 80 CCF is restricted to Rs.20,000 irrespective of the income. It is suggested it should be linked to income at least up to Rs.50 lakhs and the amount could be on a percentage basis, say, 25% of the amount of exemption limit prescribed under Section 80 C, thereby establishing a linkage.
There is need for at least partial exemption of interest on term-deposits with scheduled banks. Income-tax reduces income from bank interest roughly by one-third; hence, at least 50% of the bank interest income should be exempt from income-tax, at least up to interest of Rs.10 lakhs, if not down the line for all tax-payers.

Ajan R Prabhu, D.H.S.School, Alappuzha

Nowadays, car loans and gold loans are cheaper than educational loans. Car loans result in more consumption of oil and global warming and gold loans are used for consumption purposes. Education loans produce better citizens and creates human capital and will be an asset for the nation. The Government should bring down interest rates on education loans and make them easily available without much hassles.

Mr. Debasis Chatterji, CEO, Netxcell Limited

The real challenge for the Honorable finance minister is to maintain the growthrate at around 8% while controlling the inflationary pressure in one hand andkeeping the money supply to the market intact on the other hand.
So, I would expect that the government will not only take necessary steps tocontrol the inflation but also ensure that the accurate quantity of money is suppliedto the markets to enable the GDP growth at around 8-9%.

Mr. Rakesh Jain- DIRECTOR - CORPORATE CENTER & CFO, ICICI Lombard General Insurance Company Ltd

1. Applicability of the provisions of Minimum Alternate Tax to General insurance companies Non Life Insurance Companies (NLIC) ought to be exempted from MAT as these companies do not enjoy any tax incentives. The insurance companies are required to prepare books of accounts as per the requirements of IRDA regulations. The insurance companies do not prepare accounts as per Schedule VI of the Companies Act which is prescribed under the provisions of MAT.

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Hemant Joshi, Partner, Deloitte Haskins & Sells

Nurture and protect the goose that lays the golden eggs
With urban cell phone penetration nearing 100% and rural cell phone penetration around 25%, government’s plans for enabling rural inclusion can set big boost through telecom in disseminating banking, healthcare, education, specialized offerings for fishermen, artisans, etc. through e-connectivity. The telecom sector is expected to be 15% of India’s GDP in few years. Therefore, it needs focus, attention and support of government through various financial measures. This industry is suffering from massive litigation on tax related issues which diverts business focus and attention. Few of them are listed below:

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Mr. Arshit Pathak, Managing Director , Kingtech Electronics ( India) pvt. Ltd.

1.Immediate implementation of GST to ensure a standard VAT across the states. Today different states have different VAT and some of them have entry tax and Octoroi. In case we operate at a uniform base price and apply taxes and other levies extra, it results in different customer price for the same product in different states and it encourages cross state movement of goods. This is not good for the industry, the local traders and even respective governments, as it leads to tax evasion. If we operate at a common customer price, by having a weighted average tax load, we end up burdening the consumers of the States which has a lower rate of tax but pays for the higher tax of other state.
2.The duty on mobile accessories like chargers and batteries need to be rationalised. When these accessories are imported as an in box item, it only attract a duty of 1%, essentially the duty of the handset. When it’s imported as an accessory the duty is as high as 27 %. This leads to huge price gap between the legitimate product and the product in grey market. Also products like Battery, charger can be a safety risk and health hazard, and therefore it’s important that use of safe and legitimate accessories be encouraged.
3.Tablet is an emerging product category and has a huge potential in digitalisation of education. An efficient tablet can be made be available at even half the price of a note book and can bridge the digital divide. We would recommend that this product should be treated like a communication device and not an IT device and duty should be rationalized accordingly. It will be great initiative towards digital education.