Budget exercise begins, Kamal Nath gives a call to textile & fashion industry

14 Jan '06

4 min read

Shri Kamal Nath, Union Minister of Commerce and Industry, today invited the trade and industry represented in the high-level Board of Trade to give their inputs and suggestions for both the forthcoming Union Budget and the Foreign Trade Policy (Annual Supplement), which is scheduled to be brought out in March this year.

In his keynote address at the meeting of the Board of Trade – the first to be held outside Delhi – in Mumbai, the minister also indicated that he had taken up with the Union Finance Minister the issue of the Fringe Benefit Tax (FBT) and Service Tax incidence, which were having an adverse impact on India's export competitiveness, along with several other important proposals.

Welcoming the reports of the Working Groups and the Study Groups, which were set up last year by the Board of Trade under the chairmanship of Shri Kumarmangalam Birla, Shri Kamal Nath urged the Board to narrow the recommendations to 3 or 4 issues having the maximum impact on the exports.

The minister assured that the recommendations would be finalized soon and sent to the relevant departments for speedy implementation within a definite time-frame.

Shri Kamal Nath also announced that the Target Plus scheme would be revamped to make it more focussed and ensure that the scheme actually fulfilled its objectives.

The Target Plus scheme is an incentive scheme based on incremental exports and is being implemented at a cost of nearly Rs. 8,000 crore.

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