The indirect tax regime in India is evolving into GST in the year 2010. The steps towards introduction of GST have commenced. The Empowered Committee of State Finance Ministers has introduced the First Discussion Paper on GST in India on November 10, 2009. A dual structure of Central GST (CGST) and State GST (SGST) is proposed to be imposed on the manufacture of goods and on provision of services.
In the apex court litigants and lawyers have been paying a insignificant fee for filing appeals or vakalatnama for more than 40 years, but it may register a 20-fold boost as per a current proposal being examined by law minister Veerappa Moily.
With a new initiative, NSDL enhances Form 26AS viewing facility at internet banking account of PAN holder. For this purpose NSDL has already made the necessary arrangement with all banks under OLTAS. These banks would enable the link for Form 26AS at their Internet Banking pages.
In this process, NSDL will approve the organization to place a request for PAN registration. On such approval, the organization has to submit the list of employees for Form 26AS, along with their Valid PAN and Valid Email ID. Once NSDL receives such data, it will communicate to every employee over email and takes the confirmation for Form 26AS creation. On receipt of confirmation from Employee, NSDL will automatically create a login along with password and communicates it confidentially over the email. Employee has to login to such account with minimum days specified and activate the account.
Taxpayers who have registered to view Form 26AS online can view details of paid refund in their Form 26AS from F.Y. 2009-10 (A.Y. 2010-11) onwards. Refunds received during the selected A.Y. will be displayed in Form 26AS. For instance, refunds pertaining to A.Y. 2005-06 which are received in F.Y. 2009-10 (A.Y. 2010-11) will be displayed in Form 26AS for F.Y. 2009-10 (A.Y. 2010-11).
The Reserve Bank said it will soon come out with norms for banks to augment the capital requirements that the lenders have to keep aside against bad assets. “We will be issuing the circular (provisioning against NPAs) so you can then see details on that,” RBI deputy governor Usha Thorat told.
All that could happen, by allowing proceedings to continue, was that the assessing officer might pass an order of assessment or re-assessment. The petitioner would then have a spate of statutory remedies. The judge who heard a writ petition from the Chennai-based Jayaram Paper Mills Ltd challenging a notice of July 7, 2008 issued by Assistant Commissioner of Income-Tax, Company Circle II(3), Chennai, for AY 2004-05 ruled that the reason recorded by second respondent (ACI-T) “cannot be said to be vague”.
Hon’ble Tribunal in Poly Hose India Pvt. Ltd. V/s Commissioner of Central Excise [2003 (152) ELT 361 (Tribunal)] held that Cenvat credit could be availed even when Additional Custom Duty is paid through DEPB. The order is well balanced and deals with all the relevant points. Off course it can be argued that para 4.3 of the EXIM policy was not pleaded in that case. I am of the view that even when that para 4.3 was pleaded the result would not have been different.
In the present circumstances there are contradictory judgment of the Hon’ble apex court and in these circumstances judgment of the larger bench should be followed. In Commissioner v/s Aqua Pump Industries [1998 (102) ELT A64], 3 Judge bench of the apex court held that Dharmada amount is not includible in value and hence this decision is a binding precedent should be followed. In view of the above the author is of the view that Dharmada amount is not a part of the assessable value, notwithstanding the Circular of the Board.
There was a settled position of law that revenue is bound by the its circulars or clarification issued under Section 37B of the Central Excise Act. The principle behind such legal proposition is very simple- is an assessee has acted based on a circular issued by revenue, the revenue must not be allowed in the court of law to plead that the circular is illegal and punish the assessee for following its own circular/instruction. By no stretch of imagination this proposition is unjust or illegal.
