Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot on Friday presented a tax-free budget with a relaxation in tax regime with a sum of Rs 1,750 crore besides announcing LPG cooking gas cylinder to 76 lakh BPL families at a subsided price of Rs 500 and free electricity to the consumers using power up to 100 units per month.
The budget makes a provision of free ration for one crore families under the National Food Security Act along with the Mukhya Mantri Nishulk Annapurna Food packet per month.
With a three-point agenda of ‘Bachat, Rahat and Badhat’ (saving, relief and growth) in his 5th and last budget in third term of the Congress rule, Gehlot focused on new youth policy, youth development and welfare fund with a corpus fund of Rs 500 crore in the budget.
In his biggest announcement for the students from Class I to XII, Gehlot said, “They will be taught for free under RTE (Right to Education). At present, more than 40,000 schools are registered on the RTE portal. It has more than 4 lakh seats.”
“For the students appearing for the competitive examinations, it has been decided to make all recruitment examinations free. For this one time registration has to be done. This decision will benefit more than 50 lakh candidates. Along With this, digital libraries and residential hostels will also be built for the youth preparing for competitive exams”, he said in his 3 hours and 15 minutes long speech.
Campus placement will be arranged by the government in the college itself, he added.
To encourage sports in the state, the government has decided to organise Rajiv Gandhi Rural and Urban Olympics in the coming year in the entire state. Also, Rajiv Gandhi National Youth Exchange Program will be started for the youth. Electric scooty will be distributed to the girl students under the scooty scheme. A special task force will be constituted to prevent cheating in recruitment examinations and it will be under the Special Operation Group of Police (SOG).
In the health sector, Gehlot said per family insurance amount under CM Chiranjeevi Health Insurance Scheme has been increased upto Rs.25 lakh from Rs.10 lakh.
Presenting a separate Agriculture Budget for the second consecutive year, Gehlot told the House that the Krishak Kalyan Kosh amount has been increased from Rs 500 crore to Rs 7,500 crore. An economic assistance of Rs 40,000 would be given to the farmers/villagers who lost their cows during the Lumpy Disease spell last year, he assured.
The CM extended the Old Pension Scheme benefits to employees of all corporations, boards and other institutions, and appealed to the Prime Minister to effect social security to every citizen.
According to the budget proposal, five per cent of the total budget is meant for cyber security, tourism development fund at Rs 1,500 crore, free electricity to more than 11 lakh farmers on consumption up to 2000 units per month, reduction on VAT on Aviation Turbine Fuel to 2 per cent on commercial flights, and interest free crop loans amounting to Rs 22,000 crore to be distributed, and interest subsidy of Rs 1,000 crore.
On the revenue front, Gehlot said with the efficient management, the state’s GST increased to 31.22 percent in 2022-23 (till December) against the national percentage of 29.78 percent.