Economy

The Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) is an autonomous organisation under the Department of Agricultural Research and Education (DARE), Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare , Government of India. Formerly known as Imperial Council of Agricultural Research, it was established on 16 July 1929 as a registered society under the Societies Registration Act, 1860 … Read more

Selection Process The selection process of Smart Cities is based on the idea of Competitive and Co-operative Federalism and follows a Challenge process to select cities in two stages. In January 2016, based on the All India Competition, 20 smart cities were selected in Round 1.13 more Smart Cities were selected in May 2016 in … Read more

It is a Central Sector Scheme under which the CGST and Central Government‘s share of IGST paid by Charitable Religious Institutions on purchase of specific raw food items shall be reimbursed to them.  The charitable religious institutions include Temples, Gurudwara, Dharmik Ashram, Mosques, Dargah, Church, Matth, Monastries etc. The objective of the scheme is to … Read more

Industrial sector is a crucial sector for sustainable growth of India. The sector growth rate and its contribution to overall growth is not sufficient enough for achieving double digit growth. The benefit of achieving industrial growth is that it is employment friendly and it is a self priming system. The constraints in the development of … Read more

Unified payment interface project is to move the country towards a more cashless model. The objective is to achieve financial inclusion. New features in UPI 2.0 Linking of overdraft account – Apart from the savings and current accounts, the UPI users can now link their overdraft account to it and all the facilities and benefits … Read more

The DMIC project was launched in pursuance of an MOU signed between the Government of India and the Government of Japan in December 2006. DMIC Development Corporation (DMICDC) incorporated in 2008, is the implementing agency for the project. DMICDC has been registered as a company with 49% equity of Government of India, 26% equity of … Read more

The Finance Minister has announced the biggest consolidation plan of Public sector Banks (PSBs)- merging 10 of them into just 4.  Merger is in line with the recommendation of Narsimhan committee recommendation of creating few banks of big size ( global average). There are no banks in top 50 global banks and the role of … Read more

Tax expenditure is the revenue foregone as a result of exemptions and concessions. Tax expenditure was introduced for the first time in 2006-07 union budget.  Tax expenditure is justified on following grounds: Act as an incentive for priority sector like infrastructure. It promotes balance regional growth It neutralise the disadvantage on account of location It … Read more

The Build Operate and Transfer (BOT) Annuity Model   Under BOT annuity, a developer builds the highway, operates it for a specified duration and transfers it back to the government. The government starts payment to the developer after the launch of commercial operation of the project. Payment will be made on a six month basis. … Read more

Discrimination against women and girls is a pervasive and long-running phenomenon that characterises Indian society at every level.  India’s progress towards gender equality, measured by its position on rankings such as the Gender Development Index has been disappointing, despite fairly rapid rates of economic growth. In the past decade, while Indian GDP has grown by … Read more