To give teeth to investor redressal mechanisms, the ministry of corporate affairs is planning to set up an entirely new affiliate office with statutory powers to look into such investor concerns. To be developed on the lines of other MCA subsidiary b
The Reserve Bank of India has given permission to the Department of Posts to launch its prepaid debit card, in partnership with Master Card, which will allow customers to purchase products from all major retail outlets across the country.
The decision by the Employee Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) to stop paying interest on accounts that have not been operated for 36 months or more is expected to cover 60 per cent of the accounts. According to EPFO estimates, there were 30.5 million inoperative accounts across 120 offices. In all, the agency had 47.1 million subscribers at the end of March 2009, which is estimated to have increased during the last financial year. However, latest data on the total number of subscribers was not available.
The food processing industry can breathe easy as packaged food items may be exempted from the proposed Goods and Services Tax (GST). At present, processed food products are exempted from central excise, but most states levy Value Added Tax (VAT) on t
The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) has opposed the corporate affairs ministry move to rotate auditors and audit firms compulsory. The provision for rotation of auditors has been included in the Companies Bill, 2009, recently been vetted by th
The Income Tax (I-T) department has witnessed a 25.3 per cent improvement in advance tax collections in the state at the end of the second quarter this financial year. This is significant as the collection figures in Mumbai, which accounts for more t
The Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) has asked the telecom department for copy of special audits that were undertaken on the books of all leading telecom companies to examine the service tax angle. Last year, the government ordered special
Following the global financial crisis, protectionist measures taken by countries are on the rise. Business Line spoke to Mr Alejandro Jara, the Deputy Director General, World Trade Organisation, to find out his views on the extent of the impact of th
Ensuring a windfall for over 8 million central government employees and pensioners, the Union Cabinet on Thursday approved release of an additional installment of Dearness Allowance (DA) to employees and Dearness Relief (DR) to pensioners to compens
Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee has appreciated the monetary policy tightening announced by Reserve Bank of India(RBI) in its mid quarterly policy review today. He welcomed the RBI’s decision to raise the repo rate by 25 basis points and Reverse Repo Rate by 50 basis points. The Finance Minister expressed his happiness that the RBI has decided not to tighten the CRR from the existing 6 percent. The narrowing of LAF corridor should contribute towards a more efficient monetary policy, the Finance Minister added. He said that this should also encourage a greater absorption of liquidity by the Central Bank and contribute to further control of inflation.
