The central government on Monday proposed a plan of Rs 1,500 crore to promote digital payments in the country. Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, while presenting the general budget, said that digital payments have increased manifold in the recent past. Presenting the budget of 2021-22, he said that to further promote digital transactions, I propose a plan of Rs 1,500 crore which will provide financial incentives for promoting digital payments.
Sitharaman said that the National Research Foundation (NRF) was announced in his budget speech for 2019. He said that we have decided the formalities and the outlay on NRF will be Rs 50,000 crore in the next five years. This will help in strengthening the research framework of the country and the main emphasis will be on identified national priority areas. The Finance Minister also said that a new initiative National Language Translation Mission will also be started.
Mobile phones will be expensive
The government has decided to increase the import duty on mobile phone parts and chargers. This can make mobile phones expensive. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, while presenting the general budget for the financial year 2021-22, announced a review of 400 concessions in customs duties. These also include the mobile equipment segment. Sitharaman said that to increase the domestic value addition, we are withdrawing the rebate on mobile charger and some parts.
In addition, the import duty on some parts of mobile will be minus 2.5 percent. He said that the dual objective of the customs policy should be to encourage domestic manufacturing and connect India to the global value chain and improve exports. Sitharaman said that now our emphasis is on easy access to raw materials and export of value addition.
