In the words of our present Chief Justice of India,“….. the citizens’ faith in the judicial system will begin to wane because justice delayed is justice forgotten, excluded and finally discharged “ The quote certainly does not auger well if one were to look at pendency of tax cases in different layers of our judicial hierarchy – 28,000 cases in high courts with disposal rate of roughly 6000 each year. Ironically, the situation is worse in Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata & Chennai where the wait time ranges between 10-15 years. Not to forget the figure of 2 lac crores often debated in the Parliament as arrears of tax in dispute. These could be more staggering in the future.
The nation’s accounting standard-setting body, the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI), has changed some rules to allow both new and serving officers of the Indian Audit and Accounts Service (IA&AS) to acquire the qualification of a chartered accountant (CA).
It has been made clear that such information cannot be sought directly from the private business groups but from a government department which holds it.
The year 2009 saw mixed signals on business law and policy fronts. The New Year cheer on Press Notes 2, 3 and 4 fizzled with the implementation in sectoral tangles. But the year end’s breaking news, the Bombay High Court judgement in the Lawyers’ Collective case threatens to be a showstopper. The Court decision dwells on fundamental issues impacting our turf, whether foreign law firms can carry on non-litigious activity in India, the regulation of the legal profession, and in a macro-perspective, the judicial interpretation of restrictions in establishing liaison offices in India.
Whereas in the matter of import of Sodium Nitrite (hereinafter referred to as the subject goods), falling under sub- heading 2834 1010 of the First Schedule to the Customs Tariff Act, 1975 (51 of 1975), originating in, or exported from, People’s Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as the subject country or China PR), the designated authority in its preliminary findings vide notification No. 39/1/99-DGAD dated the 6th April, 2000, published in the Gazette of India, Extraordinary, Part I, Section 1, dated the 6th April, 2000 had come to the conclusion that
THE much-awaited perquisite valuation rules have finally been notified by the CBDT. The Board has amended Rule 3 to give effect to the abolition of FBT, announced in the Budget 2009. Vide Income Tax (13th) Amendment Rules, the Board has notified the new valuation guidelines w.e.f April 1, 2009 for the AY 2010-11. Although the rules are largely the same old wine in a new bottle but it is strange that the TPL has taken unduly long time to finalise and notify it.
An IPO is when a company which is presently not listed at any stock exchange makes either a fresh issue of shares or makes an offer for sale of its existing shares or both for the first time to the public. Through a public offering, the issuer makes an offer for new investors to enter its shareholding family.
Recently, the Special Bench of the Kolkata Income-tax Appellate Tribunal (the Tribunal) in the case of Shree Capital Services Ltd. v. ACIT (2009-TIOL-542-ITAT-KOL-SB) while dealing with a case prior to the amendment to section 43(5) of the Income-tax Act, 1961 (the Act) exempting derivative transaction as speculative in nature, held that the derivative transactions will be considered as speculative transaction under section 43(5) of the Act. Further, it was also held that the above referred amendment to section 43(5) of the Act is perspective in nature and comes into effect from Assessment Year (AY) 2006-07.
The Bangalore Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (the Tribunal) in recent case of Associated Electronic & Electrical Industries Pvt. Ltd. v. DCIT (2009-TIOL-263- ITAT-BANG) held that transfer of trade mark is not transfer of goodwill as the goodwill of a business cannot be sold without selling business itself. Thus, the trade mark and goodwill are two different assets. Further, since the capital gains on sale of trade mark came into effect from 1 April 2002 there was no capital gain on sale of trade mark for the year under consideration.
A recent report by Finance Commission taskforce has clarified many issues related to implementation of GST in India. Though there are many new matters which were considered in this report, but there some variations were observed as of the matters which were recommended in first discussion paper on implementation of GST in India, issued by 13th Empowered Committee of Finance Ministers on 11th November 2009.
