Punjab budget: Free education up to Class 12

The Punjab state government in its latest budget has made some important announcements for the benefit of the common man. For the education department, it announced free education for all students up to Class 12. Talking about the age limit of government employees, the government reduced the retirement age of the state government employees to 58 from 60 years. The budget also had some good news for the landless farmers of the state. It announced a debt waiver for landless farmers. Punjab Finance Minister Manpreet Singh Badal introduced one after another scheme in his budget speech.

He presented a budget of Rs 1,54,805 crore for financial year 2020-21 in the state assembly here. He refrained from levying any new taxes. Badal also announced to do away with Change of Land Use (CLU) charges for two years for the new industries coming up outside the municipal limits. Moreover, he reduced mandi fee on vegetables from four per cent to one per cent.

In his fourth budget of the present release, the minister also declared to allocate Rs 100 crore for giving 10 lakh free smartphones to the youth. This was one of the main poll promises of the Congress-led government. Though, the distribution of smartphones has been stopped due to the coronavirus outbreak in China. According to Badal, the state had attained a condition where there won’t be a funding gap in 2020-21 because of the government's constant attempts of bringing in fiscal judiciousness.

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