Budget 2020: Cigarettes Become Costlier, Raw Sugar Becomes Cheaper

On Saturday, 1 February, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented the annual Budget, making key announcements such as revising income tax slabs, government to sell a part of its holding in the LIC, among others.

Owing to hike in taxes, prices of products such as cigarettes, tobacco products, medical equipment will increase. While prices of raw sugar, agro-animal based products, skimmed milk, specific alcoholic beverages, soya fibre will decrease.

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Following is a detailed list of items that will became cheaper and the ones that will became costlier:

Costly

• Increase in excise duty on cigarettes and tobacco products.
• Customs duty on imported footwear increased from 25 percent to 35 percent.
• Customs duty on furniture increased to 25 percent.
• Health cess of 5 percent has been declared on import of medical equipment.
• Customs duty on wall fans hiked from 7.5 per cent to 20 percent.
• Customs duty on tableware and kitchenware doubled to 20 percent.
• Customs duty on specified items used in refrigerators and AC raised by up to 12.5 percent from the earlier 10 percent.
• Customs duty on auto and auto parts raised increased to 10 percent.
• Customs duty on import of food processing goods increased to 100 percent.

Cheap

• Customs duty halved to 5 percent on import of newsprint, light weight coated paper.
• Anti-dumping duty on purified terephthalic acid (PTA) removed.
• Withdrawal of customs duty exemption on products such as raw sugar, agro-animal based products, Tuna bait, skimmed milk, certain alcoholic beverages, soya fibre, soya protein.

(With inputs from Livemint, CNBC)