INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
relying instead on an ambitious plan to sell state assets to help finance the fiscal deficit.
For the fiscal year beginning April 1, the
government expects to earn 896 billion rupees ($12.6 billion) in dividends from the Reserve Bank of India and state-run banks and financial
rupees the government estimates for the current year.
The RBI pays dividends to the government annually, and allocated 1.23 trillion rupees
Expectation of higher income from the sale of state-owned assets may have helped the finance minister pare reliance on dividend income this
time around.
The government estimates that the RBI will pay about 600 billion rupees as dividend in the next fiscal year, Economic Affairs
Secretary Atanu Chakraborty told reporters in New Delhi Saturday.
Sitharaman is expecting to raise 2.1 trillion rupees from divestment of
state assets, up from 650 billion rupees budgeted in the financial year to March 2020