Highlights of the Indian Budget 2011/12

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Monday presented to parliament India's federal budget for the coming financial year beginning in April.

Following are the highlights of the budget:

GROWTH, INFLATION EXPECTATIONS

* Economy expected to grow at 9 percent in 2012, plus or minus 0.25 percent

* Inflation seen lower in the financial year 2011-12

SPENDING

* Plan expenditure seen at 4.41 trillion rupees in 2011-12, up 18.3 percent

REVENUE

* Gross tax receipts seen at 9.32 trillion rupees in 2011-12

* Non-tax revenue seen at 1.25 trillion rupees in 2011-12

DISINVESTMENT

* Disinvestment in 2011-12 seen at 400 billion rupees

POLICY REFORMS

* To create infrastructure debt funds

* To boost infrastructure development with tax-free bonds of 300 billion rupees

* Food security bill to be introduced this year

* To permit Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) registered mutual funds to access subscriptions from foreign investments

* Raised foreign institutional investor limit in 5-year corporate bonds for investment in infrastructure by $20 billion

* Public debt bill to be introduced in parliament soon

SECTOR SPENDING

* To allocate more than 1.64 trillion rupees to defence sector in 2011-12

* Corpus of rural infrastructure development fund raised to 180 billion rupees in 2011-12

* To provide 201.5 billion rupees capital infusion in state-run banks in 2011-12

* To allocate 520.5 billion rupees for the education sector

* To raise health sector allocation to 267.6 billion rupees

AGRICULTURE

* Removal of supply bottlenecks in the food sector will be in focus in 2011-12

* To raise target of credit flow to agriculture sector to 4.75 trillion rupees

* Gives 3 percent interest subsidy to farmers in 2011-12

* Cold storage chains to be given infrastructure status

* Capitalisation of National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) of 30 billion rupees in a phased manner

* To provide 3 billion rupees for 60,000 hectares under palm oil plantation

* Actively considering new fertiliser policy for urea

FINANCE MINISTER ON THE STATE OF THE ECONOMY

* "Fiscal consolidation has been impressive. This year has also seen significant progress in those critical institutional reforms that will pave the way for double digit growth in the near future."

* Food inflation remains a concern

* Current account deficit situation poses some concern

* Must ensure that private investment is sustained

* "The economy has shown remarkable resilience."

FINANCE MINISTER ON GOVERNANCE

* "Certain events in the past few months may have created an impression of drift in governance and a gap in public accountability ... such an impression is misplaced."

* Corruption is a problem, must fight it collectively