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The pension regulator has urged for more tax parity between the National Pension System (NPS) and other pension schemes. “This tax exemption of up to 40% of the retirement corpus is a very big step that the government has taken and which brings us closer to EPF (employee provident fund) and other pension products,“ Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority Chairman Hemant Contractor said. “So, it is a welcome move ... Hopefully ... we should see some parity between the other pension schemes.“ FM Arun Jaitley in the 2016-17 budget announced that withdrawal of up to 40% of the corpus at the time of retirement will be made tax exempt in the case of NPS. Contractor said under the NPS scheme, there has been higher growth from the voluntary or nongovernment sector. At present, the total subscriber base under NPS is 1.18 crore and the fund under management is `. 1.15 lakh crore. Contractor said the launch of the eNPS online platform to open new accounts and make contribution

Fair value accounting of financial instruments under new standards may lead to higher MAT levy; Cos in tech, manufacturing, IT, pharma and infra could be hit harder Indian companies that have moved to the new accounting standards for the June quarter could be staring at an increased tax liability of about 20% under minimum alternate tax, or MAT. Due to the way accounting is done under the new standards, Ind-AS, many transactions involving foreign exchange, securities and equity apart from certain demergers could start attracting MAT, industry trackers said. India has changed its accounting standards from GAAP to Ind-AS, which is on a par with International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), from April 1 this year. All companies with a total net worth of 500 crore or above are now following . 500 crore or above are now following ` Ind-AS. So while the financials of companies remain the same, the way they are calculated is now different, impacting the firms' profits, goodw

The government on Tuesday relaxed the approval process for foreign firms to set up their branch, liaison and project offices in the country. Except for defence, telecom, private security, information & broadcasting, and non-government organisation sectors, such approvals can now be given by designated banks. Earlier, the Reserve Bank of India was the approving authority. “Further, anyone who has been awarded a contract for a project by a government authority/PSU (public sector unit) would be automatically given approval to open a bank account,” the finance ministry stated.  Companies in sensitive sectors such as defence will continue to require RBI approval. “As a measure towards improving the ease of doing business, it has now been decided that except for a few sectors such as defence, telecom, private security, information and broadcasting and non-government organisation and except a few countries, the power to grant approvals for establishment of branch, liaison, project

Allows govt to impose 30% tax deduction at source on inflow from Cyprus The high court here has agreed with the Indian government’s 2013 plan to tax investments from Cyprus, which was used by several foreign investors to avoid taxes in India. The order would impact several foreign institutional investors (FIIs) and private equity investors which invested in India via the Cyprus route. This clears the way for the government’s decision to impose a 30 per cent tax deduction at source on inflow from Cyprus, a setback for foreign institutional investors. The notification was dated November 2013. Tuesday's court order was from a bench of judges V Ramasubramanian and T Mathivanan. According to market sources, between 2000 and 2014, inflow via Cyprus into India and Indian stock markets was Rs  38,300 crore. Pramod Kumar Chopda, standing counsel for the Union ministry of finance, Central Board of Direct Taxes and the I-T department, said the order would be a  major step towards co

Government-owned companies are among the big names that are still defaulting on the rule to have at least one woman on the board of directors. There are 57 companies on the National Stock Exchange  (NSE) that have yet to appoint a single woman on their board, according to Prime Database. A little over a third are public sector undertakings (PSUs), including blue-chip names like Oil and Natural Gas Corp, Indian Oil, and GAIL India. The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) had a little over a year before it directed that the boards of all listed entities must have at least one woman, by March 31. Pavan Kumar Vijay, founder and managing director, Corporate Professionals, says many state-owned entities haven’t complied as their parent ministries are yet to make the appointments. Shriram Subramanian, managing director, Ingovern, says PSUs generally tend to be lax in their approach. “The government has to take things seriously and not expect only corporate India to comply.

www.caonline.in News... 1.Enablement of 26QB correction facility and role of TDS officers: F.No. CIT/CPC-TDS/2015-16. 2.Calcutta HC stays service tax on senior advocate bar association. [HC Calcutta and Anr vs. Union of India & Ors]. 3.The upfront payment made for the acquisition of leasehold rights over an immovable property for a long duration does not constitute rental income in the hands of lessor. [ Foxconn India Developer (P) Ltd. and others vs... ITO, HC of Madras]. 4.CBDT notifies procedure for registration and submission of statement as per section 285BA (1) (k) of IT Act, 1961 read with Rule 114G (7) of IT Rules, 1962. 5.IT dept has activated the Aadhaar and net banking-based e-filing verification system for taxpayers to file the first appeal before CIT on similar lines of online ITR filing. For more News Like us on https://www.facebook.com/caonlineofficial Or Subscribe on mail visit : www.caonline.in

Concerned at the slow transmission of policy rate changes by banks, the Centre plans to replace interest subvention schemes with interest subsidies that do not interfere with lenders’ marginal lending rates. The government has also asked states to coordinate with one another in market borrowings so that there is no liquidity crunch. “We need to revisit our interest subventions schemes and replace them with back-ended interest subsidies that do not interfere with the marginal lending rates, and yet have the same effect on the loan repayments as the interest subventions have,” Finance Secretary Ratan Watal said at a meeting with state finance secretaries here on Monday. While the focus is on setting policy rates, equally important is the monetary policy transmission, said Watal. “This cannot be left entirely to the central bank. Our policy interventions can often interfere with the transmission of monetary policy actions.” Noting that banks have moved to a new system of marginal