Union Budget 2018: Govt announces new LPG connections to 8 cr women under Ujwala scheme

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley presents the Union Budget 2018 - the last budget of the BJP-led NDA government in the Parliament.

Earlier in the day, markets opened in the green with both indices Sensex and Nifty pushing higher than Wednesday's close. The benchmark BSE Sensex rose by 171.38 points, or 0.47 per cent, to 36,136.40 in opening trade.

Here are the key highlights:

-Have decided to take healthcare protection to a new aspirational level.  

Launching a flagship National Health Protection Scheme to cover 10 

crore poor and vulnerable families, benefiting approx. 50 crore. 

Providing Rs 5 lakh per family per year for medical reimbursement, under National Health Protection Scheme. This will be world’s largest health protection scheme

-Rs 1200 crore for the flagship programme in health wellness centres

-Eighteen new schools of planning and architecture will be set up. I propose railway university in Vodadara

-Eklavya schools to be started for Scheduled Tribe population... Propose to launch a scheme to revitalise research-based education with Rs 1 lakh crore in the next four years

-Integrated B.Ed programme to be initiated for teachers, to improve quality of teachers

-Technology will be the biggest driver in improving education

-Rs 14.34 lakh crore to be spent for providing livelihood to rural India through infrastructure building

-Loans to self help groups will increase to Rs 75,000 crore by March 2019

-We aim that by 2022, all poor people have a house to live in

-In the next financial year, we target the construction of two crore toilets under the 'Swachh Bharat Mission'

-Removal of crop residue to be subsidised in order to tackle the problem of pollution due to burning of crop residue

-Ujwala will give 8 crore women new LPG connections

-Special scheme to address air pollution in Delhi-NCR region

-Credit for agricultural activities is up from Rs 10 lakh crore to Rs 11 lakh crore

-Fishery and aquaculture and animal husbandry funds with a total corpus of Rs 10,000 crore

-Agri-Market Development Fund with a corpus of Rs 2000 crore to be set up for developing agricultural markets

-Restructured National Bamboo Mission to be launched with an allocation of Rs 1290 crore to promote bamboo sector in a holistic manner

-Grameen Agricultural Market (GRAM) will provide farmers a means



to sell directly to buyers

-Rs 500 crore announced for Operation Green

-Allocation to food processing ministry is being doubled from Rs 715 crore to Rs 1400 crore

-Cluster-model approach to be adopted for agricultural production

-The focus is on low-cost farming, higher MSP. Emphasis is on generating farm and non-farm employment for farmers

-470 APMCs have been connected to eNAM network, the rest to be connected by March 2018... Agri-Market Development Fund with a corpus of 2000 crore to be set up for developing agricultural markets

-In India, agricultural production has attained a record growth... Will double the income of farmers by 2022

-Agri-related stocks gain after it is said MSP for all crops to be increased by 1.5 times. Kaveri Seeds Co Ltd rose 2.4 per cent, Jain Irrigation Systems Ltd 2.1 per cent, Escorst Ltd rose 5 per cent, Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd rose 2.2 per cent

-The government will ensure payment of full MSP even if farmers sell below MSP

-The Minimum Support Price (MSP) of all crops shall be increased to at least 1.5 times that of the production cost

-Our government has ensured that services and benefits reach people directly. The direct benefit transfer in India is the biggest such exercise in the world

-Maximum governance, minimum government has ensured India has climbed 42 places in the ease of doing business. We are now working toward easing of living in India

-Budget 2018 will focus on agriculture and rural economy, health, infra, senior citizens

-This year’s budget will focus on strengthening rural and agricultural economy

-India grew at an average of 7.5 per cent in the first three years since 2014. It is now a 2.5 trillion dollar economy. Economy to grow at 7.2-7.5 per cent in second half of 2018-19

-All the structural reforms will help the economy in the short and long-term... India is expected to become the fifth largest economy very soon

-Indian economy has performed very well since our Government took over in may 2014. It is now the seventh largest in the world

-Introduction of GST has made indirect tax system simpler; demonetisation has reduced cash in economy, promoted digital transactions

-24 new government medical colleges and hospitals to be set up by upgrading existing district hospitals

-Rs 600 crore for nutritional support to TB patients

-One medical college per every three constituency