Notwithstanding non-applicability of Payment of Gratuity Act, 1972 to units having less than 10 workmen, units covered by the Factories Act, 1948, were to apply the gratuity law to their workers, the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court has held. Agreeing with the decision of the Joint Commissioner of Labour, Madurai (Appellate Authority under the Gratuity Act), that Section 1(3)(a) of the Gratuity Act was applicable even to establishments having less than 10 workers, under notification dated September 9, 1967 of the Department of Industries, Labour and Housing, Tamil Nadu, extending the Factories Act to all tailoring units in the State, Mr Justice K. Chandru ruled that the contention of writ petitioner (Star Tailoring, Tirunelveli) that Gratuity law would not apply to his units had to be rejected.
Under section 254(2) of the Income-tax Act, 1961, the Tribunal has the power to rectify mistakes in its order. However, the power to rectify a mistake is not equivalent to a power to review or recall the order sought to be rectified. Rectification is a species of the larger concept of review. Although it is possible that the prerequisite for exercise of either power may be similar to rectifying a mistake apparent from the record, by its very nature, the power to rectify a mistake would not result in the recall and review of the order sought to be rectified. This was held by the Delhi High Court in C.I.T. v Hindustan Coca Cola Beverages P Ltd (293 I.T.R. 163).
The ESIC’s new amnesty scheme allows defaulting employers and employees to withdraw cases for non-payment of dues, effective from January 1, 2008.
The Supreme Court directed tax payers all over the country to file Income Tax returns under the prescribed new ITR forms for assessment year 2007-08 by February 29, 2008 – the new deadline set by the government. The direction was passed after Additional Solicitor General Mohan Parasaran informed the bench headed by Justice B N Agarwal that the Centre was issuing a notification today extending the time for filing returns till February 29, next year in relation to all categories of assessees.
The Central Information Commission (CIC) has held that citizens cannot question government policies and plans by utilising the Right to Information Act. The Commission noted this while dismissing an application filed by a Mumbai resident Amin Merchant who had sought information from Finance Ministry as to why certain tariff policy was framed by the Centre.
There is good news in store for SEZ units. The government is likely to put on hold its plan of placing an export obligation on units operating in SEZs. The commerce department has suggested to the finance ministry that the government should consider imposing an export obligation only if exports from such zones fall below a threshold limit in the coming years. While the government was deliberating making it compulsory for all SEZs to export 51% of what they produce, the present average export figures of SEZs is much higher at 82%.
Now it’s the government’s turn to cash in on the stock market boom. The finance ministry is considering raising the rate at which securities transaction tax (STT) is levied. One of the options is to increase the ceiling rate to 0.5% of the value of the taxable securities transactions. At present, it is levied at rates of 0.017- 0.25% on every transaction on domestic bourses.
Has your income-tax return been picked up for scrutiny by the income-tax department? You may not get to know the reason. The department is against bringing scrutiny under the purview of the Right To Information (RTI) Act. This means an assessee will not have the right under the RTI Act to ascertain as why his case was selected for scrutiny by the department.
The Income Tax Department is planning to extend the Refund Banker Scheme to the entire country as a move aimed at expediting refund of excess tax. The scheme, launched in Delhi and Patna in March this year, was later extended to Kolkata, Chennai, Bangalore and Mumbai. It will now be extended to the entire country for the non-corporate category of taxpayers. This will facilitate quick and correct issue of refunds, an income tax official said.
The Central Board of Direct taxes have extended the last date of filing of income tax /fringe benefit tax returns due by 31st October 2007 as follows:- For electronic returns (companies, and firms requiring tax audit u/s 44AB) to 15th November 2007; and For paper returns (other than those required to file electronic returns) to 2nd November 2007. It is further clarified that the dates for obtaining tax audit report under section 44AB of the Income Tax Act have also been extended accordingly.
