Employees will now have to pay taxes on perquisites given to them by their employers as the Central Board of Direct Taxes has notified the much-awaited rules for valuation of the benefits. With these rules, the fringe benefit tax (FBT) being paid by employers for giving non-cash benefits, including cars and employee stock options (ESOPs), to employees will be abolished and replaced with a regime that will tax the perquisites in the hands of the employees. It could mean less take-home pay for employees.
The commercial taxes department has conducted 298 raids from April to November this year. These statistics were placed before the House by chief minister Digambar Kamat, who holds the finance portfolio, during Question Hour on Thursday. The additional tax collected from these raids are: Value Added Tax (VAT) from hotels -Rs 27.16 lakh; VAT from others-Rs 141.33 lakh; luxury tax from hotels-Rs 51.31 lakh, and entertainment tax from casinos – Rs 2.83 crore.
Insurance companies, while settling third party insurance claims, cannot deduct tax at source (TDS) on the interest earned on the compensation amount, ruled Bombay high court. A division bench of justice Sharad Bobde and justice SJ Kathawalla, in an interim order, directed the New India Assurance Company not to deduct tax from the amount of interest to be paid over a compensation granted to a widow, her two children and her mother-in-law.
The Council of the Institute at its 242nd meeting held in April, 2004 had decided that there shall be a cut off date for condonation of cases for empanelment purposes as on 1st January and the cases received beyond the cut off date will not be considered for condonation. Accordingly, members may note as under:
The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) and the National Stock Exchange (NSE) have decided to postpone new trading timings to January 4, 2010. The two exchanges on Wednesday said that the market would open at 9 a.m. effective December 18 an advancement of nearly an hour from the current practice of market opening at 9:55 a.m.
Indian companies paying royalty to foreign firms for technology transfer, use of brand name or trademark will no longer require government approval, as such payments have been allowed under the automatic route. “. it has been decided to permit, with immediate effect, payments for royalty, lump sum fee for transfer of technology and payments for use of trademark/brand name on the automatic route.
Bringing relief to the working class of the country facing an unprecedented price rise, the government has decided to hike the minimum wages to Rs 100 from existing Rs 80 per day. “The decision to hike minimum wages to Rs 100 per day would be implemented with retrospective effect from November 1, 2009,” a Labour Ministry source told.
India Inc has informed the ministry of finance that the government can unlock a whopping Rs 50,000 crore in revenue if it fast-tracks cases related to direct and indirect taxes that are pending in various tribunals and courts. The Confederation of Indian Industry ( CII) senior director Marut Sengupta said this constitutes about one- fourth of the Rs 2,00,000 crore that has been held up for a long time in various disputes related to corporate and income tax, excise tax and services tax.
The Parliament has passed the the Competition (Amendment) Bill, 2009 which is to replace the Competition (Amendment) Ordinance, 2009 and to further amend section 66 of the Competition Act, 2002. Rajya Sabha passed it today, while the Lok Sabha had already considered and passed it on 14th December, 2009.
The Delhi High Court has ruled that a comprehensive insurance policy for vehicles also covers the pillion rider on a two-wheeler and passengers in a car. Following the ruling, all 17 insurance companies providing insurance to two-wheelers and four-wheelers have also agreed to implement it earnestly and immediately.
