Bapatla District Anthem debut showcases government initiatives
State Energy Minister Gottipati Ravi Kumar and Collector J Venkata Murali unveiled the anthem at celebrations held at Bapatla Women's Engineering College on Friday. Written by Nandiraj Vijay Kumar, composed by J Nagapoornna and Ramadevi, and sung by a local ensemble, the anthem was selected through a district-wide contest.
Earlier, the Minister hoisted the Tricolour, conveyed 79th Independence Day greetings, received a ceremonial guard of honour from the police, and paid tributes to freedom fighters. Addressing the gathering, he outlined major welfare and development measures by the State Government, including the P4 poverty eradication programme, timely distribution of 65 lakh social security pensions on the first of every month, and investment aid to farmers under the Annadata Sukhibhava scheme. He noted aid for fishermen during the fishing ban period, Rs 490 crore for Nizampatnam harbour expansion, fish farming in Gundlakamma reservoir, and setting up 34 tobacco purchase centres.
He also highlighted initiatives like developing Bapatla Beach as a tourist hub, installing CCTV for crime control, operationalising Gundlakamma project gates to provide irrigation, implementing the Thalliki Vandhanam scheme, rolling out the Deepam scheme statewide, supplying 24×7 quality power, free 9-hour electricity to agricultural pumpsets, subsidised power to aquaculture farmers, free power to SC/ST families, handlooms, and powerlooms, and introducing India's first Integrated Clean Energy Policy, attracting Rs 4.56 lakh crore investments and advancing Green Hydrogen Valley development.
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Indian Express
5 minutes ago
- Indian Express
GoM meeting on GST reforms next week, tight timeline for Council's nod
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Giving a broad idea of the proposal, sources said most of the products and services would be placed in either of the two rates — 5 per cent or 18 per cent. Goods and services used by the common man, or as inputs by farmers, small entrepreneurs and MSMEs, will attract the lower 5 per cent duty. This will reduce the tax burden and is expected to drive consumption. Most other goods and services will attract the 18 per cent rate, they said. Sources said that in categorising goods and services as sin and demerit goods and bracketing them under the special rate of 40 per cent, the Department of Revenue has kept in mind the country's 'social ethos'. At present, there are multiple rate slabs — 5 per cent, 12 per cent, 18 per cent and 28 per cent — and a compensation cess ranging from 1 per cent to 290 per cent that is levied on sin and luxury goods such as cars, refrigerators, air conditioners, pan masala, tobacco and cigarettes. 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As per the proposal, the government is looking to implement pre-filled returns to reduce manual intervention, eliminate mismatches and compliance burden due to multiple notices. Changes will also be made on the refunds front, with the proposal aiming to provide a major portion of refunds within a fixed number of days and enable automated processing of refunds for exporters and those with inverted duty structure. 'In Income Tax, the tax department keeps your TDS (tax deducted at source) amount for one year and pays you the refund after your return filing. But since they pay fast, the taxpayer feels happy about it. In GST, there are refunds that are given three times or four times a year. But people still complain. Now, the crucial difference here is that in the case of GST, the timing is crucial, since it (the refund) is working capital for the enterprise. So, there is a need to make the processes faster. All these will be part of the process reforms,' the source said. 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Time of India
15 minutes ago
- Time of India
Kerala CM slams PM Modi for praising RSS in I-Day speech
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Time of India
19 minutes ago
- Time of India
Punjab finance and taxation minister Harpal Singh Cheema leads I-Day celebration in Ropar
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