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The Lok Sabha on Wednesday passed a Bill seeking increase in overtime working hours. The Factories (Amendment) Bill, 2016, introduced by Labour Minister Bandaru Dattatreya, seeks to increase the upper limit of workers' overtime hours from 50 hours in a quarter to 100 hours in some cases and from 75 hours to 125 hours in others involving 'public interest'. The Bill was allowed despite strong objection from the Opposition members, who raised concern that this could erode the power of states to decide on the matter. The government had first introduced the Bill 2014 in the Lok Sabha in August 2014, following which it was referred to a Parliamentary Standing Committee. While the original Bill contained provisions such as relaxation in norms related to female participation in certain industry segments and reducing the number of days an employee should work to be eligible for benefits such as leave with pay from 240 to 90, the government decided not to change those. &quo

The Cabinet on Wednesday gave ex- post facto approval to the amendments made to the Maternity Benefits Act, that aims to raise maternity leave for women from 12 weeks to 26 weeks. The Maternity Benefit Act, 1961, protects the employment of women during the time of her maternity and entitles her of a full paid absence from work to take care for her child. It is applicable to all establishments employing 10 or more persons and the amendments will help around 1.8 million women workforce in the organised sector. These amendments include increasing maternity leave from 12 weeks to 26 weeks for two surviving children and 12 weeks for more than two children, 12 weeks maternity leave to a ‘ commissioning mother’ and ‘ adopting mother’ and mandatory provision of creche in respect of an establishment having 50 or more employees, the statement said. Business Standard New Delhi,11th August 2016

Foreign investment will now be able to flow into financial services such as commodity broking and other such areas not covered in the 18 areas specified for non- banking financial companies (NBFCs). The Cabinet on Wednesday approved amendments to the Foreign Exchange Management ( Transfer or Issue of Security by the Person Resident Outside India) regulations on NBFCs to this effect. A proposal in this regard was made in the Budget for 201617 by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. As much as 100 per cent foreign investment can come into these services under the automatic route, if these services are regulated by financial sector regulators like the Reserve Bank of India, the Securities and Exchange Board of India, the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority and the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority. Besides commodity broking, foreign investment would also be allowed to come into asset finance companies, depository participants and infrastructure debt funds, sou

Inspection of bigger non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) on a more regular basis is among Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Raghuram Rajan’s unfinished agenda. In an interaction with television channels, Rajan said the asset portfolios of such NBFCs must be treated on a par of those of banks. “What we do want to ensure is the bigger NBFCs are inspected regularly and that their asset portfolios are seen with the same kind of caution we see banks’, noting, however, that because they are financed usually with longer-term money, that they have a different capital requirement, that we can be a little more liberal on the risk that they take,” Rajan said in a television interview. He called the political attacks on him as abominable. Rajan said he was open to staying a bit longer to complete the unfinished work of bank clean up, but was perfectly happy to go, too. “Some of these (recent) attacks were abominable, that is imputing sort of motives, alleging things completely witho

The government has decided to set up acommittee to look into all issues, including foreign direct investment norms on e- commerce. Business Standard New Delhi,11th August 2016

www.caonline.in News... 1. CBDT recognizes Cost Accountants as e-return intermediaries. Visit http://www.icmai.in/upload/Institute/Updates/CBDT-Intermediary.pdf for details. 2. The Parliament passed the Enforcement of Security Interest and Recovery of Debts Laws and Miscellaneous Provisions (Amendment) Bill, 2016 empowering banks to confiscate security in the case of loan default. 3. MEF for 2016-17 will be live from today (11th August) from 2pm with the option of Digital Signature. 4. SEBI introduces e-payment facility for payment of penalties, disgorgement amounts, etc. Pr no. 131/2016 dated 9th august 2016 issued by SEBI. 5. Reserve Bank of India keeps Repo rate unchanged at 6.50%. 6. Tax returns for A.Y.s 2009-10 to 2014-15 filled electronically under time limit of Section 139, to be verified through ITR V form by 31.08.16. CBDT Circular no.13/2016.