Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday presented the central government budget for the upcoming financial year 2021-22 in the parliament. The start-up sector also received a fair share of the estimated public expenditure for the fiscal year set ti begin from April 1, this year. To encourage budding start-up owners and aspiring business person, several steps have been proposed by the Finance Minister in the Union Budget that unveiled in the Lok Sabha yesterday. The allocation for Startup India initiative has been increased marginally to Rs 20.83 crore for the fiscal 2021-22 from Rs 20 crore in 2020-21.
Mostly importantly, Sitharaman proposed to provide an extension of tax holiday to start-up owners for one additional year upto March 31, 2022. Along with this, he eligibility period of claiming capital gains exemption for investment made in the startups has also been extended till March 31, 2022. Union Budget 2021: Here Is What the First Paperless Budget Has In Store for the MSME Sector.
In the Union Budget 2021-22, Nirmala Sithraman has also proposed to set up a ‘world class’ Fintech (Finance-Technology Firms) park at Gujarat International Finance Tec-City, near state’s capital Gandhinagar. It has also been proposed to apportion a sum of Rs 15,000 to enhance the penetration of digital payments as well as other measures to boost financial inclusion.
For making legal compliance and regulations easier, the finance minister has proposed to use data analytics, artificial intelligence, machine learning to make regulatory filings more frictionless for businesses and startups in a revamp of the ministry of corporate affairs (MCA) portal. Centre had said that the ministry would look to introduce AI-based features in MCA-21 when version 3.0 of the portal is rolled out. Union Budget 2021 Highlights: The 5 Big Takeaways.
MCA-21 shares crucial information about firms to various stakeholders such as the regulators, investors, creditors and companies. The MCA-21 3.0 will reportedly have various process to ease the regulatory process. It is expected to have a single source of truth, ease of doing business, e-adjudication, online compliance monitoring, among others, thereby making the authenticity and comprehensiveness of corporate affairs even better.
For the start-ups and initiatives in the healthcare and wellness sector, the Budget has proposed to allocate a sum of Rs 2.23 Lakh Crore. It includes a healthcare portal for the entire country for digital health management, as well as a Mission Poshan 2.0 for nutrition and diet programmes in rural districts.
