In a relief to the middle class, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday exempted annual income of up to Rs 12 lakh from income tax and rejigged tax slabs as part of her reformist Budget.

Presenting her eighth straight Budget in the Lok Sabha, Sitharaman laid out a blueprint for next generation reforms including raising FDI limit in insurance sector, simplification of tax laws, cutting duties on intermediaries while providing enhanced fiscal support for welfare measures.

This she did while sticking to the fiscal consolidation roadmap that projected the fiscal deficit to come down to 4.4 per cent of the GDP in the financial year 2025-26.

For the current financial year fiscal deficit has been pegged at 4.8 per cent of GDP.

To bridge the fiscal deficit gap, the government is set to raise resources from the market to the tune of Rs 11.54 lakh crore on a net basis for the next fiscal year.

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