Morning Brief: Army Finalises Mega Procurement Plan; One Million Jobs Vow By Railways; GST Rate Cuts Proposed

Good morning, dear reader! Here’s your morning news and views brief for today.

Army Finalises Mega Procurement Plan: The Indian Army has finalised one of its biggest procurement plans for infantry modernisation. "The infantry modernisation plan is a major initiative of the army and it will significantly bolster the overall capability of the foot soldiers," said a senior army official. A large number of light machine guns (LMG), battle carbines and assault rifles will be purchased at a cost of nearly Rs 40,000 crore to replace its ageing weapons. The broad process to acquire around 7 lakh rifles, 44,000 LMGs and nearly 44,600 carbines has been finalised and the Defence Ministry is on the same page with the army in moving ahead with the procurement, official sources said. The government has also sent a message to the Defence Research and Development Organisation to expedite its work on various small arms, particularly on an LMG.

New Investment To Create One Million Jobs For Railways, Says Piyush Goyal: The Indian Railways is looking to invest more than $150 billion over the next five years which would help create one million additional jobs. "During the next five years, the Railways alone will be looking at an investment of more than $150 billion. And when I translate that into jobs, I see a million jobs being created only through investments in the railway sector," Railways Minister Piyush Goyal said. A focus on infrastructure could also help increase local manufacturing, he said. Goyal said his ministry was also compressing the time taken for complete electrification of rail lines to four years from the earlier plan of 10 years, which would help cut costs by around 30 per cent. This electrification initiative would help save the national transporter around Rs 10,000 crore per annum on fuel bill, he said.

More GST Rate Cuts Proposed: A panel of state finance ministers on Sunday suggested fresh changes to the goods and services tax (GST), including a cut in the levy at restaurants and a flat 1 per cent tax for small traders. “The biggest recommendation has been simplification of the composition scheme by proposing to reduce the tax rate to a flat 1 per cent for all traders, manufacturers and restaurants under the scheme. The group of ministers has also proposed a hike in the threshold for composition scheme to Rs 1.5 crore,” one of the state finance ministers said. Sources said that the panel of five state finance ministers has suggested a flat 12 per cent GST for standalone restaurants, whether air-conditioned or not, and an 18 per cent levy at eating joints located inside hotels. Currently, restaurants frequented by the middle class face 18 per cent GST. The respite on composition scheme will also lower the burden for smaller eateries, which currently attract 5 per cent tax under composition scheme.

RBI Still Verifying DeMo Notes: The Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 bills returned to banks, nearly a year after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced demonetisation, are still being “processed in all earnest” through a sophisticated currency verification system, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has said. In reply to an right to information query, the central bank said it has processed about 1,134 crore pieces of Rs 500 notes and 524.90 crore pieces of Rs 1,000 junked notes, having face value of Rs 5.67 lakh crore and Rs 5.24 lakh crore respectively, as on 30 September. Replying to a question on providing the deadline for completing the counting exercise, it said, “the verification of notes withdrawn from the circulation is an ongoing process”. Several opposition parties have announced that they would observe 8 November, the first anniversary of demonetisation, as ‘black day’. To counter the opposition protest, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party has decided to observe the note ban anniversary as “anti- blackmoney day”.

India And Japan Conduct Naval Drill: The Indian and Japanese navies on Sunday began a three-day anti-submarine warfare exercise in the Indian Ocean region to deepen their operational coordination in the strategically important sea lanes around the two countries. The anti-submarine exercise comes within two months of the summit meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe, in which the two sides decided to step up their military cooperation. The two armies are set to carry out their first war games next year. Japan's Foreign Minister Taro Kono last week had said that Tokyo favours a dialogue between Japan, the US, India and Australia to further boost strategic partnership among the four countries with the underlying objective of creating a front against Chinese muscle-flexing in the Indian Ocean region.

A Day Of Crucial Hearings At Supreme Court: The Supreme Court will today hear a string of high-profile cases from Aadhaar to ‘love jihad’ in Kerala. A bench led by Justice A K Sikri will hear the West Bengal government’s petition against the Centre’s move to make Aadhaar, a 12-digit unique identification number for citizens, mandatory to get social welfare benefits. Another bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra will take up petitions seeking repeal of Article 35(A), a law that guarantees special privileges to the restive state of Jammu and Kashmir. A bench led by Misra will also hear a Muslim man’s request for overturning a Kerala high court order that cancelled his marriage with a Hindu girl after she converted to Islam. Misra questioned the order in the previous hearing. Other cases listed for today are, a case related to reforms in Board of Control for Cricket in India and a case demanding strict guidelines for children’s safety in private schools.

Investment Boost For Capital Markets: International investors have pumped in close to $3 billion (Rs 18,000 crore) in the Indian capital markets so far this month due to “high nominal and real yields” and stable macroeconomic conditions. “Indian bonds remain attractive on high nominal and real yields as well with the backdrop of macroeconomic stability and hence it continues to attract FPIs,” Quantum Adviors Head Fixed Income and Alternatives Arvind Chari said. Another major reason could be increase in limits in Indian bonds by Reserve Bank of India and capital markets regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India by Rs 14,200 crore for October-December 2017. According to the latest depository data, FPIs invested a net sum of Rs 2,806 crore in the stock markets and another Rs 15,132 crore in debt, taking the total to Rs 17,938 crore ($2.75 billion) during 3-27 October.

Kidambi Srikanth Creates History: Kidambi Srikanth created history as he became the first Indian player to win four Super Series titles in a year after he won the men's singles title at the French Open on Sunday. He defeated Japan's Kenta Nishimoto 21-14, 21-13 in the final to achieve this feat. The win ensured Srikanth, who played his fifth Super Series final this season, bag his second consecutive title in two weeks after winning the Denmark Open in Odense last week. Srikanth, thus, became only fourth men’s singles player to win four or more Super Series titles in a calendar year. Previously, superstars Lin Dan, Lee Chong Wei and Chen Long were the only three players to have accomplished this feat.

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We hope you enjoyed reading our morning brief. Have a great day ahead!

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