Union Budget 2013-14: All you need to know

1) No revision of personal income tax slabs; relief in first bracket through tax credit of Rs.2,000 for earnings up to Rs.500,000 (approx $9,000)
2) Ten percent surcharge on income exceeding Rs.1 crore (Rs.10 million/$180,000) a year; only 42,800 people have declared such income.
3) Collective responsibility to ensure dignity and safety of women; recent incidents have cast a dark shadow; stand in solidarity with our girl children and women; will keep them safe and secure.
4) Rs.1,000 crore allocated for establishing Nirbhaya Fund.
5) Rs.97,000 crore (Rs.970 billion/$18 billion) for women's development.
6) Defence allocated Rs.203,672 crore (Rs.2.03 trillion/$37 billion), an increase of five percent.
7) Import duty on high-end vehicles raised from 75 percent to 100 percent.
8) Excise duty on cigarettes to be increased 18 percent.
9) No change in service tax of 12 percent.
10) No service tax on vocational courses run by institutes affiliated to state governments.
11) Service tax on all air conditioned restaurants regardless of whether or not they serve alcohol.
12) No service tax on agricultural testing procedures.
13) Rs.9,000 crore allocated for compensating state for differential in central sales tax and GST.
15) No change in customs duty on non-agricultural products.
16) Modified law to prevent tax avoidance to come into effect April 1, 2016.
17) 100 percent tax deduction for contributions to National Children's Fund.
18) Education cess to continue at 3 percent.
19) 11 lakh people have benefited from direct cash transfers; scheme to be rolled out across the country during UPA-2 term (May 2014).
20) Property transactions skewered; TDS of one percent where transaction exceeds Rs.50 lakh.

21) Tax on mutual fund redemptions reduced from .25 percent to .001 percent.
22) Cities to be encouraged to promote waste to energy projects.
23) Rs.800 crore provided to promoting wind energy.
24) Two new ports to be set up in West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh to add 100 million tonnes handling capacity.
25) Allocation of rural development ministry allocation raised by 46 percent to Rs.80,294 crore; Rs.33,000 crore for rural jobs scheme.
26) Budget expenditure for 2013-14 at Rs.16 lakh 65,297 crore; plan expenditure at Rs.5 lakh 55,224 crore and
27) Tax-free infrastructure bonds of Rs.50,000 crore to be issued.
28) Regulator to be appointed for road projects; 3,000 km of road projects to be awarded in first six months of 2013-14.
29) Incentive allowance of 15 percent over and above permitted depreciation to those investing over Rs.100 crore in infrastructure projects.
30) Foodgrain production during 2013-13 estimated at 250 million tonnes.
31) Hope parliament will pass food security bill; Rs.10,000 crore allocated for initial expenditure on implementation.
32) Human resource development ministry to get Rs.65,867 crore.
33) Rs.13,250 crore allocated for midday meals scheme.
34) Rs.17,700 crore allocated for Integrated Child Development Scheme.
35) Drinking water and sanitation ministry allocated Rs.15,260 crore.

Happy Valentine Day..!!

So finally Valentine's day is here. None of us know the origin of this day but we have got a good excuse to get our girlfriend laid on the bed. Every Indian talks about the culture but the days like Valentine's Day are kept under a quota where no one will bring culture into the scene. The day is officially meant for ---king and kissing. Girlfriends know that the boyfriends have called them and what is going to happen next. But then, do they stop? No. Because its Valentine's day and the day is meant to --ck and get --cked. The people in my Social Networking environment named the day differently. Some called it a Hawas day while some called it Tharki Day while some called it I-Pill day. I would just call it the day when boys use their girlfriend as nicely as they can and they feel that they got all the money refunded which they spent on them for the whole year.

There used to be a time when boys were known to use a girl's body on the name of love and then leave them. Today, it is different. It is a Give-and-take deal. But this rule is unsaid. If you'll discuss this, you are hurting a girl's sentiments. A boy will keep spending everything on girl. He will pay for her movie tickets, burgers, Water Kingdom entry fees, Puri or Goa's traveling charge, sandals, birthday cakes, hotel bills, mobile recharges and almost every basic expenditure. In return, girl will let him kiss herself, play with her hairs, uncloth herself and in the end, --ck herself. This is an unsaid agreement between Boyfriends and Girlfriends today. I am just shocked to see that I have no female friends of mine who are less than 27 and are not yet committed to someone.

If you still doubt that Valentine day is not meant for sex, go to a medical shop and ask him the amount of condoms supplied to him by the distributor and the amount of demand boys have for the condoms in the first 15 days of February. Your will really shock, and if Valentine's Day has nothing related to Sex, why is Children's Day scheduled on 14th November, exactly 9 months after Valentine's-Day????

It's Valentine's day. Good for the people who are committed and have a partner to celebrate it. But the one who have been single throughout the life will feel themselves more stupid on this day. And the one like me who are being fooled by a girl in past will keep haunting in the memories and may feel depressed at times. So, for committed people, its --CKING DAY, for yet-to-be-committed-people, its EXPECTATION DAY, for the people who have broken off, for them it is MEMORY DAY. The same day plays different part for different people. I just don't understand why do people celebrate such days when they know that they are doing the same thing every day. Some may propose their favorite person and ask them to be their valentine, for these people, I have respect as they have guts…, but others those are committed from years, talk everyday on cellphones, meet every week and --ck every month, why do they celebrate this day and make others feel unwanted in this world? I seriously feel like supporting Shivsena on such days. I do like the dandas of Shivsena entering their ass in front of public….

Fine. A Very Happy Valentine's Day, Expectation Day and Memory Day to all the people falling in different categories. The one who falls in Valentine's Day group can also be wished Hawas Day as they are going to end all the Hawas they have in them and experience pre-marital sex. A very Happy Profit Day to all the pharmaceutics and hotels. A very Depressing Day to all the parents of this world whose children are going to do what they did for giving them birth. And, I don't know whether all of you have heard it or not but Asaram Bapu has asked to celebrate Parents Worshiping Day today by worshiping our parents. So, the followers of Asaram Bapu, Happy Mata-Pita Poojan day to you, and the people who is very smart and married on this day, Happy Suhagraat to you…., and finally, the people who are reading this post, a Happy Nonsense Day to you all….

Extremely sorry if it hurts you.. Jinke zindagi mein pyaar na ho wo kya jaaney ki Valentine's pe kya likhtey hain….

Thanks.

A Visit to Puri (29-01-13)

A visit to Puri - City of Jagannath

This was my third visit to the Puri. First was when I was a kid, not much in memories, It must have been a week-long trip (from what I have been told and from what I remember). Second, a few years back with my mom during Rath-Yatra, when one of my cousin posted at PURI (ECR), the Best visit with lot of fun on and with the jovial humongous inviting waves of the Puri beach. But this time it was an unplanned short visit to the city with some of my new-n-special-friends and Surprisingly, I had a completely different experience this time around.

Why Puri..?

In this new-year, we decided to go on a audacious-trip, and destination Puri was selected (since PURI was within the close proximity of 500 Kms from Kolkata, where one can have all the fun, learning & holism under one roof) trip was chalked out for couple of days, dates were finalized & bookings were made accordingly….

Sunrise at Puri Beach..

After reaching PURI, firstly we were suppose to check-in our HOTEL and we have also headed for the same but can’t resist to have a glance of ‘Sunrise at Beach’ and we ran to witness the same just behind. (off-course it was our Hotel’s private beach) Enormity and power of the sea, can only be felt at a Bay of Bengal beach, Arabian Sea has got a different flavor. I’ve been to beaches around Mumbai, and have heard of Ganapatiphule, Goa etc; but none is close to what’s offered at Puri. White long beach with multi storey high waves, what else you can wish for!!

 

Call by Lord Jagannath..

As decided, next was to visit the Holy Jagannath-Temple. We returned from beach, checked-in our Hotel room and started getting fresh.. (Advice: always take 1-2 hrs in your hand if you are with girls)

Jagannath Temple – A far view It’s advisable to strike a deal with some Panda (or Purohit) before you enter the Temple. Pandas are the persons who guide the devotees through the Temple and associated obligations. However we have ‘Deepika’ with us (being a Oriya she was a bit acquainted with this place). Non-Hindus are strictly prohibited inside the temple, when we were passing through the Singhadwar (Main-Gate), there was a Panda who was striking everybody with stick of Jagannath, amicably hit my back and said, ‘Bhagwan ki Chaddi’.

It’s my personal experience that you must keep at least a dozen of Rs 10 notes. They come handy, when some Panda pulls you towards the small temple under his authority, does his puja forcefully and asks for dakshina. Around the main temple, there are some hundreds of smaller temples and also a wish tree. Since we were waiting for the main gate to open, we visited a few of them, and took some rest sitting at one of the temple, however I found Shilpi & Gouri busy with looking over the archeology of the temple (one must admire their stamina)….

Again we have headed for Garbha-griha, to have the darsan of Lord Jagganath, finally I got the opportunity.. I really wonder how Shilpi, Deepika & Gouri were with me in that massive-crowd…. Then we came-out and had our lunch..

Bay-Watch..

The main beach of Puri! You’ll fall in love with it. Though it’s almost always full of people, it’s so long that you’ll easily find a small place exclusively for you and your friends.

I recalled each minutes of Beach, how we enjoyed bathing, toppling, somersaulting and above all photographing together. We shed our clothes and had a crazy run in to the waters.., Even Shilpi went to wet his feet in the waves crashing on the shore.. (Off-course she was not allowed to do so)..

At the beach there were local people selling “pearls” and “stones” collected from sea at prices of Rs 5-25!! There were camels for giving ride and chairs were available on rent at the rate of Rs 20 per hour to sit and enjoy. We “rented” chairs as the beach was quite dirty.

Two-Hours with divinity, we left the place for journey back to our Hotel.. While returning we kept walking on the waves and tiny seashells….

 

It’s Shopping Time..

Deepika, Gouri & Ajeet went for some last minute shopping but I prefer to stay with Shilpi..

Let’s call it a ‘HOLY-DAY’..

It would have probably the boring evening, without the call of Gouri to turn’s our room into the ‘Dance-Floor’. Thanks to the DJ’s performing at the rear-Lawn.

After that we started pack up to continue our journey..

In route, we stopped for PHUCHKA (as we have two phuchka-lovers with us) followed by Dinner at Station..

As the train sped towards my destination, I don’t know why I wanted the ‘time’ or ‘train’, to go slow….

Next day we reached our home with the memories of a wonderful trip..!!

Best wishes,

Amaresh Gupta