KOCHI l saturday l february 08, 2025 l `9.00 l PAGES 18 l LATE city EDITION Modi to meet Trump next week during two-day U.s. visit: MEA Prime Minister Narendra Modi will reach the US on February 12 for a two-day working visit, the Ministry of External Affairs said on Friday Trip comes as India faces don’s tariff threat Foreign secretary Vikram Misri said the visit will give further direction and momentum to the India-US relationship. “There is a clear convergence of interests between the two in several areas,” he said. It also comes as India faces Donald Trump’s tariff heat. The Republican has launched a global trade war by raising tariffs on goods from China, Canada, and Mexico | P9 ■ Sept 21 prime minister to visit france on Monday ■ “The fact that the Prime Minister has been invited to visit the US within barely three weeks of the new administration taking office shows the importance of the India-US partnership,” Misri said Prior to his US visit, Modi will be in France from February 10-12 to co-chair the AI Action Summit with President Emmanuel Macron When prime minister Narendra Modi last visited the u.s. CHENNAI ■ MADURAI ■ VIJAYAWADA ■ BENGALURU ■ KOCHI ■ HYDERABAD ■ VISAKHAPATNAM ■ COIMBATORE ■ KOZHIKODE ■ THIRUVANANTHAPURAM ■ BELAGAVI ■ BHUBANESWAR ■ SHIVAMOgGA ■ MANGALURU ■ TIRUPATI ■ TIRUCHY ■ TIRUNELVELI ■ SAMBALPUR ■ HUBBALLI ■ DHARMAPURI ■ KOTTAYAM ■ KANNUR ■ VILLUPURAM ■ KOLLAM ■ TADEPALLIGUDEM ■ NAGAPATTINAM ■ THRISSUR ■ KALABURAGI TEST IT. LOVE IT. OWN IT. THE BOLD NEW NISSAN MAGNITE RANGE STARTS @ ₹6.12 LAKH* BENEFITS UP TO ₹70 000* 9833 800 700 #BoldInsideOut POSITIVE VIBES, ONLY Balagopal says severe financial constraints over, state ready to take off No big populist initiatives in last full budget of Pinarayi 2.0 regime Lower fiscal deficit, higher revenue receipts projected Land taxes increased by 50%; now, pay more to buy an EV priced `20 lakh and above will be taxed at 10%. The budget introduced If positive sentiments are enough a 10% road tax on electric cars with to boost Kerala’s struggling econo- battery renting facility irrespective , my Finance Minister K N Balagopal of the cost of the vehicle. , may have done his bit. In his last full Balagopal, in his fifth budget, also budget before the next assembly announced several innovative measelections, Balagopal presented a ures, including utilising empty and rosy picture of the state finances, unoccupied homes across the saying the economy has overcome state in and around the severe financial constraints and tourism destinawas set to embark on a phase of rap- tions like Fort Kochi, id growth. Kovalam, Munnar He prudently refrained from an- etc., to boost tourism nouncing any major populist initia- even while providtives, and projected an ambitious ing revenue growth of around 15% (nearly f o r the `20,000 crore) in revenue receipts in house own2025-26 to `1,52,351.67 crore but ers. He laid stopped short of spelling out the out plans to faprecise roadmap to achieve the im- cilitate the setpressive number. ting up of Global While the budget had schemes Capability Centres targeting almost all sections of so- (GCCs) for multinationciety and made allocations to almost al corporations (MNCs) to all sectors, the main theme of the help youngsters to get producspeech was spreading positivity af- tive jobs here. ter years of financial distress. He also announced a ‘New In“We have definitely overcome the nings’ project to encourage senior trying times of severe fiscal con- citizens to launch novel enterprisstraints that had affected the state es/industries utilising their finanin recent cial capaciyears. It ty and KERALA would be amexperience. ply clear to Explaineven the casing the higher ual observer revenue reof Kerala’s developmental pursuits ceipt projections, Dr K Ravi Raman, that the state is all set to embark on an expert member of Kerala State a phase of rapid economic growth. Planning Board, pointed out that If we put in the language of devel- Kerala’s GSDP grew 6% in 2023-24 in opment discourse, Kerala is in a comparison to 4.2% the previous stage of take-off,” Balagopal said as year. he began his budget speech that “Further, there has been a decline lasted two and a half hours. in non-plan expenditure while the He expanded the budget size (total plan expenditure has risen by 7%. expenditure) from `178,771.84 crore This will naturally lead to higher to `198,582.40 crore, and sought to revenue mobilisation,” said Dr exhibit an image of fiscal prudence Raman. by projecting a lower fiscal deficit Jose Sebastian, an expert in pubof 3.16% in FY26 compared to 3.51% lic finance and taxation, however, in FY25. opined that the budget was a missed In an effort to augment revenue, opportunity for the LDF governthe finance minister tinkered with ment in terms of identifying new the land taxes, increasing basic revenue mobilisation avenues. rates across all slabs by 50% with “There were immense possibilithe lowest tax slab going up from `5 ties for resource mobilisation. For per are (2.47 cents) a year to `7.5 per instance, Kerala spent `50,275.91 are. At the highest slab, the rise is crore in 2022-23 on health and edufrom `30 per are to `45. Balagopal cational sectors. What we got is only also proposed an increase in one- `676.85 crore, just 1.35%. Tamil time road tax on private electric ve- Nadu gets `6.84 for every `100 spent hicles (EVs). on health and educational sectors. While the tax on EVs costing Kerala could have easily increased above `15 lakh has been increased it to 5% by taxing the richer section to 8% from the current 5%, the EVs of the population,” he said. What’s up Land tax hiked by 50% to mobilise L100 cr Court fees hiked to mobilise L150 cr RAJESH ABRAHAM Tourism infra K-Homes project to maximise the potential of unoccupied houses and enhance tourism infrastructure. H5 cr allocated for the project — which aims to provide affordable accommodation— proposed to be implemented within 10-km radius of tourist destinations New Innings The budget has proposed a new initiative — ‘New Innings’ — to encourage senior citizens to launch novel enterprises and industries using their financial capacity and experience. I5 cr is earmarked to Startup Mission to implement the scheme. GCC PARKS H5 cr allocated for establishing Global Capability Centre (GCC) parks, by facilitating basic infrastructure as well as for preparing feasibility reports. INSIDE Realistic guarantees or empty promises? | p2 FM gives govt employees something to cheer about | p2 Freeing up ‘land’-locked value to propel growth |p4 Tax for electric vehicles and contract carriage vehicles hiked 50% hike in road tax for 15-year-old and above two-wheelers and three-wheelers What’s down Tax for stage carriages reduced by 10% IlluS: Sourav roy WHAT’S IN BUDGET L10,431.73 cr earmarked for health sector A750 cr set aside for first phase of rehabilitation of those affected by landslides in Wayanad The FM said, this year, Kerala will become the first state to achieve the status of having dialysis units in all district/ general/ taluk hospitals and C3,061 crfor roadsunder PWD bridges L700 cr earmarked for Karunya Arogya Suraksha Padhathi (KASP) insurance scheme that covers nearly 42 lakh families C1,160Mission housing Sabarimala masterplan crfor C1,033.62crallocated projects for under LIFE the L50 cradditional allocation forto proposed special package mitigate human-wildlife conflict The budget is a positive intervention to boost the creation of Nava Keralam. It gives equal importance to short-term welfare measures and long-term development — Pinarayi Vijayan, Chief Minister Preliminary work for T’Puram metro rail to begin this year. Action has been initiated for preparing plan for Kochi Metro Phase II The finance minister has presented the LDF government’s farewell budget as the cut in allocations will make the government dysfunctional — V D Satheesan, Leader of Opposition express read Boy dies after falling into Plea for transfer of MUDA Bangla envoy summoned drainage pit at airport case probe to CBI junked over ‘negative’ remark 50 private members’ bills tabled in Rajya Sabha Kochi: In a tragic incident, a three-year-old boy, who was part of a group of tourists from Rajasthan, died after falling into a drainage behind a cafeteria outside the domestic terminal of Kochi airport on Friday. The deceased is identified as Rithan Jaju, of Gayathri Nagar, Bundi, Rajasthan. Nedumbassery police have started a probe into the incident after registering a case for unnatural death. P3 New Delhi: The Rajya Sabha on Friday saw the introduction of nearly 50 private members’ bills, with a focus on emerging technologies and workplace rights, as well as efforts to enhance parliamentary productivity. A significant proposal came from TMC member Mausam B Noor, who introduced the Artificial Intelligence (Protection of Rights of Employees) Bill, 2023. P9 Bengaluru: The Karnataka High Court on Friday dismissed a petition filed by social activist Snehamayi Krishna seeking its direction for a CBI probe into the alleged irregularities in allotment of 14 compensatory MUDA sites to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s wife. The material on record nowhere indicates that the probe conducted by Lokayukta police is partisan, lopsided or shoddy, the court said. P9 New Delhi: The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on Friday summoned Bangladesh’s Acting High Commissioner to India following protests lodged by Dhaka over the “highly aggressive” remarks made by former PM Sheikh Hasina. The Ministry of External Affairs clarified that Hasina’s comments were made in her “individual capacity” and stressed that India had “no role to play” in it. P9 *T&C Apply CYBER SECURITY Figured out GROWTH INFLATION RBI forecasts FY26 growth at 6.7% on better Rabi harvest, tax relief Inflation rate pegged at 4.2% in FY26 CHEAPER LOANS Home, auto, small business loans to see a drop in interest rates Banks to have ‘bank.in’ and non-bank financial entities ‘fin.in’ domain names to check cyber security threats RBI tango with FM gives 1st rate relief in 5 years B E NN K OC H UV E E D A N @ Mumbai SEEKING to build on the feelgood factor generated by the Budget, which announced significant tax cuts, the Reserve Bank of India on Friday cut interest rates by 25 basis points to 6.25%. This is the first repo rate cut in five years and, together with the income tax relief, could give a big boost to consumption-driven growth. The immediate impact of the rate cut is that it will make home, auto, and small business loans cheaper; loans on floating interest rates will automatically come down by 25 bps. The latest cut brings curtains on the second longest high interest rate regime since the rate revision on October 22, 2008 ended a 5.1-year wait for the repo to fall from 8% after the global financial crisis that began in September 2007. Friday’s rate correction comes after five years, as the last cut was in May 2020 when RBI cut rates by an unconventional 50 bps to 4% during the peak of the pandemic. While industry Delhi election results today as well as the markets were not impressed by the nominal 0.25% repo rate cut as they expected more, what is striking in the policy announcement this time is the tone of new governor Sanjay Malhotra’s statement; it says the monetary policy should be more accommodative to growth concerns than inflation. This signals a shift in approach by the central bank as taming inflation is the legal mandate of the monetary authority . RBI expects economic activity to improve with agricultural output remaining upbeat, while manufacturing is set to recover in the second half of 2025. Accordingly, Malhotra said the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) is confident of the economy growing at 6.7% next fiscal compared to 6.4% in FY25. On inflation, the MPC sees prices moderating and finally aligning to the lower end of the target through the year. It sees inflation closing this fiscal at 4.8% and 4.2% in FY26. Counting of votes will take place on Saturday to decide whether AAP retains power for a third consecutive term or BJP forms govt after 26 years Cuffing avoidable, shared concerns with US: Centre J aya n t h J a c o b @ New Delhi Amid widespread outrage over mistreatment of 104 deportees from the US, Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri on Friday said India has registered concerns with the US authorities, adding handcuffing was avoidable. “It is a valid issue to raise and we continue to emphasise to the US authorities that there should be no mistreatment. We will continue to take up any instances of mistreatment that come to our attention. Action needs to be taken across the system against the underlying ecosystem that thrives on promoting illegal immigration,” the foreign secretary said. Asked whether India, like 487 more Indians face deportation The US has notified about 487 other individuals, believed to be Indian nationals, against whom removal orders have been issued. Of these, the nationality verification process is underway for 295, Misri said Brazil and Colombia, had protested the use of handcuffs and chains on deportees, Misri said, “We have been in touch with the US and have registered our concern.” Responding to yet another question of whether there is any record of the government of the day (Congress-led UPA) protesting the use of restrains since 2012, the foreign secretary said there was none. 18 pages, including 4 pages of KOCHI Express