# GST

• India’s Gross goods and services tax (GST) hit a fresh high of ₹1.67 lakh crore rupees in April, with revenues from goods imports rising 30% year on year.
• Industry experts attributed the part of the surge to a massive uptick in input costs for producers.
• Overall GST revenues were 20% higher than a year ago and 17.9% higher than the March 2022 collections of 1.42 lakh crores.
• For the first time Gross GST collection has crossed ₹1.5 lakh crores mark.

# e-Shram portal

• Top functionaries of the Union labour and employment ministry said that ministry is working on a mechanism to process accident insurance claims by unorganized workers registered on the e-Shram portal.
• e-Shram portal has seen over 27 crore registrations so far.
• The portal was launched six months ago with the aim of creating a national database of unorganized workers and to facilitate social Security schemes for them.

# Pakistan

• Saudi Arabia has agreed to provide Pakistan a “sizeable package” of $8 billion to help the cash starved country bolster dwindling foreign exchange reserves.
• Pakistan has faced growing economic challenges, with high inflation, sliding forex reserves, a widening current account deficit and a depreciating currency.
• The financial package includes a doubling of the oil financing facility, additional money either through deposits or sukuks (Islamic financial certificate) and rolling over of the existing $4.2 billion facility.

# India-UAE

• The India-UAE comprehensive economic partnership agreement (CEPA) the biggest bilateral trade pact between the two major economies, was, activated on Sunday.
• The agreement was signed on February 18 between the two sides.
• The India- UAE CEPA is the first of the major bilateral trade pacts that India has been negotiating to Kickstart International trade post pandemic.