HIGHLIGHTS OF UNION BUDGET 2026-27

These are the highlights of the Union Budget Speech 2026-27 presented by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in Parliament today:

• To establish a new National Institute of Design to boost design education and development in the Eastern region of India. 
• Support will be provided to strengthen domestic manufacturing. Sectors will be identified and facilitation groups comprising senior officials and industry representatives will be constituted for select products and supply chains. 
• To set up East Cost industrial corridor with provision of 4,000 ebuses.
• To set up a Centre of Excellence for Artificial Intelligence in Education with an outlay of ₹500 crore.
• To launch Bharat Vistar, a multilingual AI tool that can integrate the agri stack portals with AI systems to enhance farm productivity.
• To issue identity cards and e-Shram registration for gig workers on online platforms, along with health cover under PM Jan Arogya Yojana.
• To set up dedicated ₹10,000 crore SME growth fund. Enterprises to be based on select criteria.
• India must remain deeply integrated with global markets — exporting more and attracting stable long-term investments.
• To establish new dedicated freight corridors connecting Dhanpuri in the East to Surat in the West
• 20 new national waterways to be operationalised over the next 5 years, starting with National Waterway 5 in Odisha to connect mineral-rich areas.
• To set up seven high speed rail corridors between cities--Mumbai to Pune, Pune to Hyderabad, Hyderabad to Bengaluru, Hyderabad to Chennai, Chennai to Bengaluru, Delhi to Varanasi, Varanasi to Siliguri.
• India must remain deeply integrated with global markets — exporting more and attracting stable long-term investments.
• To establish a new National Institute of Design to boost design education and development in the Eastern region of India.

DIRECT TAX PROPOSALS

• Income Tax Act 2025 will come into effect from 1st April 2026.
• Simplified income tax rules and forms will be notified shortly.
• Interest awarded by the motor accident claims tribunal to a natural person will be exempt from income tax.
• To provide safe harbour to non-residents for component warehousing in a bonded warehouse at a profit margin of 2% of the invoice value.
• To provide tax holiday till 2047 to any foreign company that provides cloud services to customers by using data centre services from India. 
• Revised returns can now be filed by Mar 31, instead of Dec 31.

INDIRECT TAX PROPOSALS

• To provide basic customs duty exemption to the import of capital goods required for the processing of critical minerals in India. 
• To exclude the entire value of biogas while calculating the central excise duty payable on biogas blended CNG.
• To extend duty exemption given to capital goods used for manufacturing lithium ion cells to those used for manufacturing lithium cells for energy storage systems.
• To exempt basic customs duty on import of sodium antimonate for use in manufacture of solar glass.

IN DEPTH COVERAGE