The Union Cabinet in its meeting today has approved the proposal of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting to approve of the ‘Policy Guidelines on Expansion of FM radio broadcasting services through private agencies (Phase-Ill)’. Cabinet has also cleared the proposal of the Ministry for conducting ascending e-auction, as followed by Department of Telecommunications for the auction of 3G and BWA spectrum, mutatis-mutandis, for award of license of FM Channels, as recommended by the GoM on Licensing Methodology for FM Phase-Ill.
Constitution of panel of Senior Standing Counsels and Junior Standing Counsels for handling cases of Indirect Taxation cases before the Hon’ble High Courts/other Judicial forums
The Central Bureau of Investigation has registered a case u/s 120B IPC r/w 420 IPC and 13(2) r/w 13(1)(d) of P.C. Act 1988 against the then Additional Central Provident Fund Commissioner and other 8 then officers of EPFO Delhi who had entered into a criminal conspiracy with Managing Directors, two Director & one General Manager, HR of Delhi based private firm. In pursuance to this criminal conspiracy the accused allegedly created false records in respect of certain employees engaged, inflated the number of excluded employees, manipulated the period of engagement of employees and thereby manipulated the amount of Provident Fund liability which was due and payable by the said private firm.
Following the announcement in the Second Quarter Review of Monetary Policy 2010-11 (paragraph 107) that guidelines stipulating the prudential limits to regulate the investment of banks in companies engaged in forms of business other than financial services will be issued separately, the Reserve Bank of India the Reserve Bank of India today released on its website, Draft Guidelines on Equity Investments by scheduled commercial banks in subsidiaries and other companies for comments and feedback.
The Union Finance Minister Shri Pranab Mukherjee said that during the global financial crisis of 2008, our GDP growth rate lowered to 6.8 per cent in 2008-09 but the economy rallied back with an 8 per cent growth in 2009-10. Shri Mukherjee said that the overall GDP growth in 2010-11 was estimated at 8.5 per cent and there is no reason why this momentum cannot be maintained in fiscal 2011-12 and improved further in the coming years.
In a major haul, the VAT department of Government of Delhi has confiscated 56 trucks in the capital for transporting goods without paying the required taxes. The trucks were confiscated in an operation carried out by 15 teams comprising officials of VAT department last night during which checkings were carried out on 463 vehicles on all interstate roads connecting Delhi.
The government today extended duty-free import of sugar for two months till August-end amid inflationary pressure. The zero-duty sugar import deadline, which expired on June 30, has been extended till August 31, this year, a notification issued by the Finance Ministry said. The government had abolished import duty on sugar in February 2009 to boost domestic supply. Prior to that the import duty was 60%.
Leading credit information company, CIBIL, on Wednesday launched Credit Information Reports for companies to help them access the system data before they go for raising a loan or other financial dealings. Till now, Credit Information Bureau India (CIBIL) shared data regarding a company’s financial history (loans drawn earlier, repayment history, etc) with banks which helped latter assessing the risk associated with a company before lending.
The government will come out with a draft ‘negative list’ for service tax in two weeks, meaning services which are not mentioned in it would be taxed under the proposed GST regime. The draft paper (on negative list of services) is nearly ready and you should see this paper in two weeks, Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Finance, V K Garg, told PTI.
The Special Judge for CBI Cases, Bangalore has today convicted Smt.K.Chandrika (IRS -2004 Batch), the then Assistant Commissioner, Bangalore in a bribery case of Rs.2 lacs. She was sentenced to undergo three years Simple Imprisonment with a fine of Rs.1.50 lacs. The complainant, a Managing Director of Bangalore-based firm, had alleged in his complaint that the accused had demanded a bribe of Rs.10 lacs from him for reducing the tax liability of his firm. The CBI laid a trap and the accused was caught red handed while demanding & accepting a bribe of Rs.2 lacs from the complainant on 2nd January, 2009.
