Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday announced the 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat Rozgar Yojana' stimulus package, which incentivizes employees who join EPFO registered establishments with a monthly wage of less than Rs 15,000.

"I am announcing the Aatmanirbhar Bharat Rozgar Yojana which will incentivise creation of new employment opportunities during the Covid-19 recovery phase. This will be applicable for those joining employment in EPFO registered establishments on monthly wages less than Rs 15,000 per months," said Sitharaman.

"This will be effective from October 1, 2020. They will be covered for two years," she added.

During the press conference, Ms Sitharaman presented the current state of the economy and assured that active recovery is happening in the country. She said that markets are at record high and the foreign reserves had reached US $560 billion.

It may be mentioned that Ms Sitharaman's remarks on the economy came on a day when a panel of Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said India is witnessing recession.

The finance minister further listed the progress in the key schemes announced by the government in the past months, like 'One Nation One Ration Card', PM SVANidhi (PM Street Vendors' Atmanirbhar Nidhi). 

"Twenty eight states have implemented the national portability under 'One Nation One Ration Card' scheme with effect from September 1, 2020. It now covers 68.6 crore beneficiaries who no have the option to lift their foodgrain from any FPS of choice in any of these 28 states/UTs," she said.

A day earlier, the Union cabinet approved Rs 2 lakh crore as production-linked incentive (PLI) package to boost demand in the country. It also launched a Rs 8,100 crore viability gap funding (VGF) scheme to encourage private participation in social infrastructure such as water supply and solid waste management.

Meanwhile, Indian shares had snapped an eight-day winning streak on Thursday as investors locked in gains from banking and financial stocks ahead of the announcement.