Key indices gained sharply after Finance Minister Piyush Goyal announced massive tax relief for middle class. At 12:51 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, was up 293.58 points or 0.81% at 36,550.27. The Nifty 50 index was up 82.45 points or 0.76% at 10,913.40.

Interim Finance Minister Piyush Goyal announced full tax rebate for individual tax payers with annual income under Rs 5 lakh. He claimed that with the current provision for rebates and exemptions, people with salaries up to Rs 6.2 lakhs will be effectively exempted from tax. Exemption on tax deducted at source on interest earned from bank, post office savings raised to Rs 40000 from Rs 10000.

India is poised to become a 5 trillion dollar economy in the next five years and become a 10 trillion dollar economy in the next eight years. Piyush Goyal said that the fiscal deficit has been brought down to 3.4% in the revised estimate of 2018-19. The government had set a fiscal deficit target of 3.3% of GDP in February 2018. Piyush Goyal increased the budgetary allocation for India's flagship rural employment scheme, Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee scheme. The scheme will get Rs 60000 crore as against Rs 55000 crore rupees promised in the last Budget.

For welfare of farmers and for doubling their income, historic decision taken to increase MSP by 1.5 times the production cost for all 22 crops, Finance Minister Piyush Goyal said. He also announced a steady income support to help farmers in view of depleting income from agriculture.

The interim budget is the last one presented by the current NDA government led by Prime Minister Modi, before the 2019 general elections in April. The Budget session of Parliament began yesterday. The session will conclude on 13th of next month.

Three PSU bank stocks rose after the Reserve Bank of India permitted these banks to exit the prompt corrective action framework. Bank of Maharashtra (up 3.85%), Oriental Bank of Commerce (up 1.41%) and Bank of India (up 0.29%) edged higher.

On a review of the performance of Public Sector Banks (PSBs) currently under the Prompt Corrective Action Framework (PCAF), it was noted that a few banks are not in breach of the PCA parameters as per their published results for the quarter ending December 2018, except Return on Assets (RoA). However, though the RoA continues to be negative, the same is reflected in the capital adequacy indicator. These banks have provided a written commitment that they would comply with the norms of minimum regulatory capital, Net NPA and leverage ratio on an ongoing basis and have apprised the Reserve Bank of India of the structural and systemic improvements that they have put in place which would help the banks in continuing to meet these commitments.

Further, the Government has also assured that the capital requirements of these banks will be duly factored in while making bank-wise allocations during the current financial year, RBI said in a statement yesterday, 31 January 2019.

Taking all the above into consideration, it has been decided that Bank of India and Bank of Maharashtra which meet the regulatory norms including Capital Conservation Buffer (CCB) and have Net NPAs of less than 6% as per third quarter results, are taken out of the PCA framework subject to certain conditions and continuous monitoring. In the case of Oriental Bank of Commerce, though the net NPA was 7.15%, as per the published results of third quarter, the Government has since infused sufficient capital and bank has brought the Net NPA to less than 6%. Hence, it has been decided to remove the restrictions placed on Oriental Bank of Commerce under PCA framework subject to certain conditions and close monitoring, RBI added.

Film and media sector sector stocks advanced after Piyush Goyal announced single window clearance for filmmaking to Indian filmmakers.

Mukta Arts (up 8.93%), Inox Leisure (up 1.78%), Eros International Media (up 1.94%), Balaji Telefilms (up 0.66%) and Zee Entertainment Enterprises (up 0.05%) edged higher. PVR was down 0.94%.

Single window clearance for ease of shooting films will be made for Indians filmmakers, which was only available for foreigners earlier. Anti-camcording provision will be introduced to Cinematography Act to fight piracy, Finance Minister Piyush Goyal said in the interim budget 2019-20.