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Why is there difference in perception as to when one becomes a senior citizen?
Mohini Bhatnagar, New Delhi
The Railway Budget 2011-12 has elevated a large number of women to the rank of senior citizens — they will achieve that status at 58 itself. Men will get concession in the matter of rail fare at the age of 60.
One wonders whether the Budget will follow suit and vest females the status of senior citizens much early . As it is, the Income-Tax law grants this status on reaching 65 irrespective of one's sex.
Service tax conundrums
Why is it that only some services are liable to service tax?
Sowmyanarayana Iyengar, Srirangam
When service tax was introduced way back in 1997, only three services were covered — insurance, brokerage and telephones.
More and more services have been added over the yearsIt must be levied on all services without picking and choosing that gives the impression that lobbies are at work to ward it off.
Goods and Services Tax (GST) promises to usher in equality, but the rollout of GST itself is mired in uncertainty.
New price index
What is the new consumer price index all about?
Srilatha Menon. Kochi
The Central Statistical Organization (CSO) has at last acted upon the suggestion made by National Statistical Commission way back in 2001 that consumer price index should be more meaningfully and less divisively constructed. Right now we have urban index for industrial employees and non-industrial employees and rural index for agricultural workers and plantation workers.
The new indices would be just three - rural, urban and combination of both. They are likely to capture the true macro picture at the state levels.
But headline grabbers have always been the wholesale price index (WPI) which ironically does not take the huge services expenditure into account.
And to this extent, our policies, decided as they are by WPI unlike in the advanced countries where CPI holds sway, are bound to be skewed.
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