UPA's reforms juggernaut: Highlights of FM's speech

With all 21 big ticket items getting cleared by the cabinet today, the government has rolled out reforms juggernaut in style. Here is a snapshot of what finance minister P Chidambaram read out on super Thursday:

* Cabinet approves insurance and PFRDA Bills, proposes foreign equity cap in both sectors be hiked to 49 percent. Parliament to take up bills in winter session.

*Cabinet cleared as much as 26 per cent FDI in pension . Currently, no foreign investment is allowed in the pension sector. This move will require parliamentary ratification as well.

* After a 20-year wait, the overhaul of the Companies Bill picks up steam. Cabinet approves amendments to the bill, which will be taken up in winter session.

*The competition regulator gets more teeth; amendments to the Competition Act get cabinet approval. CCI jurisdiction to extend to all sectors, except merger of banks.

* The cabinet approved the declaration of five airports as international airports. At Lucknow (Chaowdhury Charan Singh airport), at Varanasi (Lal Bahadur Shastri airport), at Trichurpurli, at Mangalore and Coimbatore. These airports have all the infra to receive international flights. In fact some flights were already operating, immigration customs facilties have been provided. By declaring them as international airports, we expect there will be more international traffic.

*The government also approved the 12th Five-Year Plan (2012-17) which envisages to remove infra bottlenecks and aims to achieve annual average economic growth rate of 8.2 percent, down from from 9 percent envisaged earlier, in view of fragile global recovery. The document will now be placed before the National Development Council (NDC), the apex decision making body, for the final approval.

*Cabinet approved ratification of Nagoya Protocol. Nagoya Protocol is signed by 92 countries.

*Cabinet Okayed grant of  Rs 130 crore to ITI for salary payments.