Indirect tax revenue growth continues, driven by strong service tax expansion and positive excise and customs trends.
Indirect tax collections for April-February rose to Rs.3,48,702 crore, a 14.6% increase year on year, with February collections up 9.6%. The aggregate comprises Customs, Central Excise and Service Tax, each showing varying growth-Customs moderate, Central Excise modestly positive, and Service Tax strongly buoyant-and the department attained about 88.7% of the Budget Estimate through February.

Loan agreement establishes multilateral financing for Assam urban infrastructure to expand water, wastewater, waste and transport services.
Signing of a Loan Agreement among the Government of India, the Asian Development Bank and the Government of Assam establishes Tranche 1 financing under a multi tranche facility to expand piped water supply and wastewater treatment in Guwahati, upgrade solid waste management and drainage in Dibrugarh, and develop a rapid bus transit corridor in Guwahati to improve urban service delivery and environmental health.

Personal income tax exemption expanded and wealth tax restructured; GAAR safeguards and independent review recommended to reduce uncertainty.
The Committee recommends raising the personal income tax exemption and restructuring progressive tax slabs with CPI linkage; substantially increasing the wealth tax threshold and adopting slabbed wealth rates; imposing safeguards on GAAR by placing the onus of proof on the Department and requiring independent review of GAAR orders; restoring a longer NRI non residence stay subject to disclosure and anti fraud conditions; and advancing administrative reforms including assessing officer accountability, optional group tax consolidation, limitation of delegated rule making, and targeted technical amendments on indirect transfers, shipping freight, house property, life insurance treatment, ESOP timing, and enhancement of individual deductions.

Public debt management outlines reporting reforms and institutional steps to improve transparency and medium term debt sustainability.
Public debt management explains measurement and reporting conventions separating Consolidated Fund debt and Public Account liabilities, netting certain NSSF related items and treating MSS liabilities separately because proceeds are sequestered. It emphasizes elongating the maturity profile of dated securities, relying on domestic savings and bank SLR holdings for financing, and institutionalising professional debt management through a proposed Debt Management Office. The paper also sets out NSSF reforms to align small savings rates with market yields, altered investment and repayment terms, and stress sensitive scenarios for future dated securities financing under alternative SLR and bank holding assumptions.

Infrastructure Debt Fund tax incentives enable PPP focused long term debt mobilisation for infrastructure projects with NBFC or mutual fund structures.
An Infrastructure Debt Fund through a PPP may be structured as an IDF NBFC or as a mutual fund under RBI and SEBI regulations; fiscal measures include reduced withholding tax on interest and income tax exemption for IDFs to attract domestic and offshore debt, and the IDF will raise debt capital to invest in PPP infrastructure projects that have completed one year of operations.

Disinvestment via stock exchange mechanism resulted in weighted average price above floor for ONGC share offer.
Offer for sale of 5% of paid-up ONGC equity was conducted on NSE and BSE under SEBI guidelines; bids were received, some cancelled for member action or insufficient funds, and valid bids covering 42,04,16,170 shares were accepted. The Volume Weighted Average Price exceeded the floor price, producing the aggregate bid amount for exchange-based disinvestment allotment.

Tariff value revision for imports: notified values for brass scrap, poppy seeds, gold and silver now apply to customs valuation.
Notification No.15/2012 Customs (N.T.) dated 29 February 2012 revises the tariff value schedule for specified imported goods, notably updating values for brass scrap (all grades), poppy seeds, and publishing values for gold and silver where benefits of Notification No.3/2012 Customs are availed; these unit values are to be applied for customs valuation and import duty assessment for the listed tariff headings.

Harmonized Master List of infrastructure sub-sectors guides agency support; new additions need assessment of infrastructure characteristics and development relevance.
Approval of a Harmonized Master List of infrastructure sub-sectors creates a non-binding common reference to guide financing agencies, allowing each agency to select sub-sectors to support with justification; new additions require assessment against the six characteristics of infrastructure and one or more development parameters, and updates will be handled by a DEA chaired Committee which will recommend changes to the Finance Minister.

Repayment at par for government special bonds; maturity proceeds payable by bank credit or pay order under securities regulation.
Repayment at par of the specified Government special bonds is due on the stated maturity dates and interest stops thereafter. If a State-declared holiday under the Negotiable Instruments Act falls on a payment date, repayment will be made on the previous working day. Maturity proceeds to registered holders must be paid by pay order with bank particulars or by electronic credit to the holder's bank account; holders should submit bank details in advance or tender discharged securities at designated paying offices twenty days before maturity to obtain payment.

Autonomy and independence of supreme audit institutions: recognition reinforces SAIs' expanded performance audit role and objective reporting.
India's ASOSAI chairmanship advocates widening public audit mandates from probity and compliance to objective evaluation of outcomes, urging auditors to provide balanced, positive reporting and recommend mid-course corrections to improve service delivery. The statement affirms the autonomy and independence of Supreme Audit Institutions as essential for objective audits and promotes regional cooperation and capacity-building, including an environmental audit training facility.

Capacity building for supreme audit institutions boosts regional public audit cooperation and training infrastructure through multilateral exchanges.
A regional assembly of supreme audit institutions convenes to advance public audit cooperation by exchanging ideas, promoting and publishing professional research, and supporting capacity building. A related donor-steering meeting emphasized capacity building, presenting a national audit institution's training infrastructure and bilateral projects as models for strengthening developing SAIs and coordinating donor support.

Public audit cooperation: ASOSAI Assembly spotlights capacity building and knowledge exchange to strengthen Supreme Audit Institutions.
The Assembly emphasizes strengthening cooperative public audit frameworks by facilitating exchange of ideas, experiences, and the publication of research to improve audit practices across member Supreme Audit Institutions. The INTOSAI Donor meeting highlighted the Comptroller and Auditor General of India's training infrastructure and bilateral capacity building projects, underscoring mechanisms for technical assistance and institutional development for developing SAIs.

Loan agreement to finance transmission and distribution upgrades in Assam, enhancing capacity, efficiency and access.
A Loan Agreement was signed under a Multitranche Financing Facility to finance transmission and distribution upgrades in Assam, setting out shared financing between ADB and the State, loan term and grace period with an ADB LIBOR-based interest rate mechanism, project implementation obligations, and infrastructure measures including substation capacity additions, modernization of 33/11 kV substations, high-voltage distribution systems and conversion to aerial bunched cables to reduce losses and expand access.

Public private partnership model enables ADB loan to develop solar power transmission and support feed-in tariff implementation.
An ADB loan will finance a transmission system for the Charanka Solar Park using a public private partnership model where state agencies lease land and provide common infrastructure while developers receive an attractive feed-in tariff. The LIBOR based loan from ADB's Ordinary Capital Resources has a 25 year term including a five year grace period. Associated Technical Assistance administered by ADB will provide vocational training and livelihood opportunities, targeting at least half women participants, and the project seeks to support distribution companies' clean energy procurement and promote the solar park PPP model.

Infrastructure financing secures ADB tranche to expand continuous rural electricity and feeder separation in Madhya Pradesh.
Agreement for an ADB loan tranche provides project financing to expand reliable, continuous electricity supply to rural households in Madhya Pradesh by establishing separate feeders for households and agriculture, installing high voltage distribution systems, extending new household connections, and reducing transmission losses, supplemented by concessional technical assistance and counterpart funding from the state government and three distribution companies.

Mutual cooperation between supreme audit institutions enhances capacity building and training support for developing audit offices.
Mutual cooperation between supreme audit institutions emphasizes collaborative capacity building and training exchange, with a national audit department offering its training institutes to assist officials from the INTOSAI community and less developed Supreme Audit Institutions under donor coordinated support frameworks.

Social security expansion strengthens worker protection; ESIC modernization and schemes improve access to healthcare and cash benefits.
The speech emphasises expansion of the Employees' State Insurance Scheme to broaden comprehensive social security-medical care, cash benefits and institutional infrastructure-alongside increased public expenditure on social services. It situates ESIC reforms within demographic challenges and government programmes for health, education and skills, and highlights operational measures including an IT digitisation roll-out (Project Panchdeep), entry into medical education, and an unemployment allowance scheme to improve delivery, transparency and access for beneficiaries.

Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters expands multilateral tax information exchange and recovery cooperation following India's ratification.
India ratified the Multilateral Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters, becoming the first non OECD, non Council of Europe party to the amended Convention. The Convention provides a multilateral legal basis for cooperation on all taxes, founded on standards of transparency and exchange of information. Operative mechanisms include compulsory exchange of past information in criminal tax matters for a specified period, assistance in tax recovery, simultaneous tax examinations with cross border participation, automatic exchange and spontaneous exchange of information, service of documents abroad, and conditional use of information for other purposes like anti money laundering with supplier approval.

Aadhaar-enabled payments to channel government transfers into interoperable electronic accounts, expanding access and reducing leakage.
The report recommends converting government payments and receipts into an interoperable, Aadhaar-enabled electronic payments architecture: directing social-benefit and subsidy transfers into Aadhaar-linked accounts, mandating electronic payment acceptance by government entities without surcharge, and promoting electronic salary credits for frontline workers. It proposes a platform approach comprising a Government e-Payments Gateway for straight-through fund release, an Aadhaar account opening and authentication capability, an Aadhaar Payments Bridge for routing transfers to accounts by Aadhaar identifier, an interoperable MicroATM network for last-mile access, and mobile banking; and it recommends a government-paid last-mile transaction fee to incentivize access infrastructure.

Supreme Audit Institution support: donors and INTOSAI coordinate funding and strategic capacity building under MoU.
A Memorandum of Understanding between INTOSAI and donor partners creates a coordinated framework to strengthen Supreme Audit Institutions through mobilised donor funding, strategic focus on governance and development roles, demand-driven sustainable support based on strategic and development action plans, and a hierarchy of country, regional and INTOSAI-global activities. Implementation is overseen by a jointly chaired multilateral Steering Committee composed of donor and INTOSAI representatives to ensure coordinated assistance and strategic oversight.