Finance Minister P Chidambaram has announced the Union Budget for the fiscal year 2005-06, largely guided by the framework set by the UPA government agenda. Building of an enabling infrastructure particularly for the rural areas and urban slums is priority in this Budget.
Government has set the target of connecting the remaining 1,25, 000 villages to the electrical grid. In the same period, remaining 66,882 villages will be given telephone connections.
Formulation of job-led growth has been the mandate of the current UPA government, and the creation of about additional 7 million jobs is in the IT sector by the year 2009 is envisaged.
Building basic infrastructure especially in rural areas and urban slums will be supported by the revival of the Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF) through infusing a corpus fund of Rs. 8000 crore for this fiscal year. The Mission 2007 initiative, aiming towards setting up Village Knowledge Centre in every village by Indias 60th independence anniversary, will also be financed by the RIDF.
The Bharat Nirman, conceived by the President, proposes a four-year business plan for building the infrastructure in rural India in the areas of irrigation, roads, water supply, housing, rural electrification and rural telecom connectivity.
Removal of customs duty on specified capital goods as stipulated in the recent Information Technology Agreement (ITA) is major development proposed in this budget.
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