The Hindu : LS passes Finance Bill

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Apr 30, 2002

Front Page

Front Page

LS passes Finance Bill

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI APRIL 29. Ignoring the criticism of some of the alliance partners of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in the Lok Sabha today, the Union Finance Minister, Yashwant Sinha, today steered clear of any announcement regarding reduction in the prices of kerosene or fertilizer, but held out the assurance that direct tax rates would not be increased in future in order to shore up tax revenues. Instead, the emphasis would be on better compliance to improve collections, he said.

Replying to the debate on the Finance Bill 2002, Mr. Sinha defended himself against the charge of being a ``rollback Minister''. He reeled out statistics to show that his immediate predecessors, Manmohan Singh and P. Chidambaram had not only moved amendments to their budget proposals, but had, in fact, moved more amendments than he had this year. He, however, stuck to the number of amendments moved by each of the three Finance Ministers and did not go into the substance of the amendments moved by them.

The House later passed the Finance Bill through a voice vote, along with the official amendments moved by Mr. Sinha giving effect to the changes in proposals he had announced last Friday. With this, the Lok Sabha gave it approval to the general budget 2002-03. The Bill will now go to the Rajya Sabha and then to the President for consent.

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Front Page

Stories in this Section

Paswan quits, to vote against Govt.

PM to join peace march

CRR cut, bank rate unchanged

Mayawati to be sworn in on May 3

LS passes Finance Bill

NBW against RIL executive

Protest against Jayalalithaa

President anguished

Daud Merchant sentenced to life