India Budget 2023-24: What's cheaper and what's costlier?

New Delhi: India's government will raise its capital expenditure by 33 per cent to 10 trillion rupees ($122.29 billion) in the next fiscal year, the finance minister said on Wednesday, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi tries to create jobs ahead of a general election.

The government is pressing ahead with putting the fiscal house in order, as it's key to winning higher credit score from ratings companies and keeping investor faith in the economy. India is currently rated at the lowest investment grade by all three main credit rating companies.

A number of commonly used items will become more expensive for consumers as a result of the budget. Mobile phones and television sets manufactured in India will be cheaper due to reductions in Basic Customs Duty (BCD) on imports of their components, but smokers will pay more because the government has raised taxes. With the finance minister raising customs duty, fully imported cars, including electric vehicles, and those assembled in India with imported parts will become more expensive.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the move is to further deepen domestic value addition in manufacture of mobile phones. She also proposed to reduce the BCD on parts of open cells of TV panels to 2.5 per cent to promote value addition in the manufacturing of televisions.

Here's a list of items that are likely become cheaper and costlier in next financial year: