NEW DELHI: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman Friday proposed to raise the annual turnover limit from Rs 250 crore to Rs 400 crore for availing a lower corporate tax rate of 25 per cent. The proposal would cover 99.3 per cent of the companies operating in the country, she said while presenting Union Budget 2019-20 in the Lok Sabha.

She further said only 0.7 per cent of the companies will now remain outside the 25 per cent corporate tax bracket, she said. The corporate tax rate is 30 per cent at the moment.

The government in 2015-16 Budget said the corporate tax rate would be gradually lowered to 25 per cent from 30 per cent over the next four years and exemptions available to companies would be phased out.

In Budget 2016-17, the government reduced corporate tax rate to 25 percent for companies with turnover less than Rs 50 crore in financial year 2015-16. This benefitted 96 per cent of the total companies filing tax returns.

In 2018-19 Budget, the reduced rate of 25 percent was extended to companies with turnover of up to Rs 250 crore in 2016-17, a move which benefited micro, small and medium enterprises.