FM Nirmala Sitharaman presser: 10 key takeaways

Finance Minister on Saturday came out with a slew of measures aimed at to curbing the current economic slowdown.

At a press conference, Sitharaman said that inflation was under control and there was a clear sign of revival of industrial production. A major chunk of the measures announced was focused on boosting the housing and export sectors along with other minor relief measures for smaller taxpayers.

Here are the 10 key takeaways from the finance minister's press conference:

1. Push for affordable housing: A Rs 10,000 crore fund will be allocated by the Government of India and roughly the same amount will be raised from outside investors under a Special Window for unfinished affordable housing units which are not NPAs or facing bankruptcy proceedings under National Company Law Tribunal. External Commercial Borrowing (ECB) guidelines will be relaxed to facilitate financing home buyers who are eligible under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY)

2. Government employees to get house building advance at a lower interest rate to push more government servants to buy new houses.

3. Relief for smaller taxpayers: Smaller taxpayers with minor procedural defaults will not be prosecuted. For defaults below Rs 25 lakh, the prosecution will be sanctioned only with the approval of a collegium of two Chief Commissioner or Director General of Income Tax rank officers. Prosecution will be launched only in deserving cases and will depend on the degree of the offence.

4. Dubai-like shopping festival in India: India will be organising annual mega shopping festivals across four locations starting in March 2020. The themes of the festival will range from handicrafts, textiles, leather to yoga and tourism.

5. Incentives for exporters: Remission of Duties or Taxes on Export Product (RoDTEP) will replace The Merchandise Exports from India Scheme (MEIS) under Foreign Trade Policy of India from January 2020. The scheme will incentivise exports more than the existing schemes. A quick and fully automated refund system to speed up the refund of input tax credits under the GST will be rolled out by the end of September 2019.

6. Export credit boost: The scope of the export credit insurance scheme will be expanded with higher insurance cover to banks lending working capital for exports. This, along with other measures, will reduce the overall cost of export credit, interest rates included and is expected to help boost MSMEs. The move is expected to cost Rs 1700 crore per year.

7. The Priority Sector Lending norms are under consideration with an addition of Rs 36,000 crore to the current 68,000 crore export credit which falls under the priority sector.

8. Free-trade agreement concessions - FTA Utilisation Mission headed by a senior officer in the Department of Commerce to work with the Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO) and export houses to utilise concessional tariffs in each FTA.

9. Reduction of export time: Time to export or turn-around time in airports and ports matching international standards will be reduced through an action plan which will roll out by December 2019. Technology and digitization will be used to further facilitate this. An inter-ministerial working group under the Department of Commerce will monitor export finance.

10. Boosting Handicraft: Special relaxation will be offered to facilitate and onboard handicraft artisans and cooperatives on e-commerce sites and help exports along with mass enrolment of artisans across the country with the help of the Textiles Ministry.