The Union governments move to suspend Accounting Standards 11, allowing companies to show foreign currency liabilities as assets, has come under the Bombay high courts scanner. The petition filed by an organisation of city-based legal experts, Just Society, has claimed that this permits firms that might otherwise be sick to paint a rosy picture .
ICAEW excludes and fines Darren Merchant for false travel expense claims. A senior KPMG employee who dishonestly claimed more than £43,000 in expenses has been excluded from the ICAEW and fined. At an ICAEW disciplinary hearing, Darren Merchant of Dartford, Kent, admitted to claiming £43,087 in air travel.
A dozen private nursing homes and hospitals today lost their approval granted under Section 17(2) of the Income Tax Act on the basis of an assessment conducted by the Department of Income Tax, Chandigarh. According to Chief Commissioner (Chandigarh region) P K Chopra, this has been done after it came to the notice that hospitals and nursing homes reviewed were not employing adequate number of medical staff (doctors and nurses) required under the prescribed rule.
Mergers on individual banks will not be forced, and no time frame has been set for the consolidation process in the banking system, financial services secretary R Gopalan said today. Merger of state-run banks should be done with a view to bring in good synergies, on mutual interests of the concerned entities, and government will not compel the consolidation process on individual banks, he said said at a Bancon conference here.
After taxing investors for dividend stripping, the Income Tax (I-T) Department is gearing up to tax bonus stripping. Official sources say scrutiny of returns filed by companies, brokers and individuals active in the stock markets and in possession of shares revealed wide use of this mechanism to evade tax.
SBI chairman O P Bhatt on Monday said that interest rates are likely to go up in the coming months if the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) tightens its monetary stance. He has also warned that loan defaults, particularly from the SME segment, may rise over the next two quarters. “Inflation is rising and there are fears that regulatory action may lead to hardening of interest rates,” SBI’s chairman said at the Bancon conference in Mumbai.
Writ Petition bearing No. 50 of 2010 (Indian Exporters Grievances Forum & Other vs. CIT) challenging the constitutional validity of Rule 8D has been admitted on 12.1.2010 by Hon’ble Shri Justice Dr. D.Y. Chandrachud and Hon’ble Shri Justice J.P. Devadhar of the Bombay High Court.
To help special economic zones (SEZs) absorb global economic shocks, the government plans to allow them to make available their excess installed capacities for the use of industrial consumers in the domestic tariff area (DTA). The idea is to ensure that industrial capacities built up in SEZs don’t remain idle in case another global slowdown occurs and dry up export demand. Of course, such contract manufacturing by SEZs would be bereft of any tax relief.
The tribunal has set a wrong precedent by arrogating to itself the power vested in it, said Sebi. The tribunal had directed the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) to grant in-principle approval to the issue, allotment and listing of shares issued by a market participant to its promoters on a preferential basis. It was, however, rejected by BSE.
The annual budget date is being advanced from the normal practice of being presented on February 28, because February 27 is a government holiday on account of Prophet Mohammad’s birthday and February 28 is a Sunday. The Cabinet is expected to approve the date soon.
