BUDGETARY FILLIP

The finance minister announced a series of key measures to stimulate growth and hence employment besides improving skilling among job-seekers

INFRA

➜ Outlay for PM Awas Yojana enhanced by 66 per cent to over Rs 79,000 crore

➜ Capital investment outlay increased steeply for the third year in a row by 33 per cent to Rs 10 lakh crore, or 3.3 per cent of GDP. This is almost thrice the outlay in 2019-20

➜ Provision for creation of capital assets through grants-in-aid to states. The effective capex of the Centre is budgeted at Rs 13.7 lakh crore, 4.5 per cent of GDP

➜ Fifty-year interestfree loan to state governments to continue for one more year to spur investment in infrastructure, with an enhanced outlay of Rs 1.3 lakh crore

➜ An Infrastructure Finance Secretariat to assist all stakeholders for more private investment in infrastructure

➜ A capital outlay of Rs 2.4 lakh crore for Railways—the highest ever, about nine times the outlay in 2013-14

➜ One hundred critical transport infrastructure projects for last- and first-mile connectivity for ports, coal, steel, fertiliser and food grains sectors identified. They will be taken up on priority with investment of Rs 75,000 crore, including Rs 15,000 crore from private sources

➜ An Urban Infrastructure Development Fund (UIDF) to be set up for public agencies to create urban infrastructure in Tier 2 and 3 cities

➜ To promote tourism, 50 destinations to be selected through challenge mode

➜ An Agriculture Accelerator Fund to be set up to encourage agristartups by young rural entrepreneurs

MSMEs

➜ Government and government undertakings to return 95 per cent of the forfeited amount relating to bid or performance security in cases of failure by MSMEs to execute contracts during the Covid-19 period

➜ Revamped credit guarantee scheme starting April 1, 2023 through infusion of Rs 9,000 crore in the corpus. This will enable additional collateral-free guaranteed credit of Rs 2 lakh crore. The cost of credit will be reduced by about 1 per cent

SKILLING

➜ Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana 4.0 to be launched to skill lakhs of youth in the next three years. On-job training, industry partnership and alignment of courses with the needs of industry will be emphasised. The scheme will also cover new-age courses like coding, AI, robotics, mechatronics, IOT, 3D printing, drones, and soft skills. To skill youth for international opportunities, 30 Skill India International Centres will be set up across different states

➜ A unified Skill India Digital platform to be launched for enabling demand-based formal skilling, linking with employers, including MSMEs, and facilitating access to entrepreneurship schemes

➜ 157 new nursing colleges to be set up in colocation with the existing 157 medical colleges established since 2014

➜ Facilities in select ICMR labs will be made available for research by public and private medical college faculty and private sector R&D teams to encourage collaborative research

➜ Dedicated multidisciplinary courses for medical devices will be supported in existing institutions to ensure availability of skilled manpower for futuristic medical tech, highend manufacturing and research

➜ Teachers’ training will be re-envisioned through innovative pedagogy, curriculum transaction, continuous professional development, dipstick surveys and ICT implementation

➜ An integrated online training platform, iGOT Karmayogi, to be launched for government employees to upgrade their skills and facilitate a peoplecentric approach

➜ A hundred labs to develop apps using |5G services will be set up in engineering institutions