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List of exempted items to be thrashed out by state & central govt officials after rate structure is finalised to be pruned Salt, bread, fresh fruit and vegetables, eggs, milk, curd, blood (yes blood, the human kind), prasad (the sacred kind), the national flag, kumkum, bindi-sindoor, glass bangles, even contraceptives -all these will continue to enjoy a taxfree run under the proposed goods and services tax (GST) regime. A few essential services will also escape the levy under the new regime that the government wants to roll out from April 1next year. All the same, the list of exempted items that will be thrashed out by state and central government officials shortly after the rate structure is finalised will be getting shorter. “The exemption list is to be pruned,“ said a government official outlining the broad principle that will be followed in deciding what doesn't get taxed under GST. But “those items that are ex empted under value added tax will likely remain out of th

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Thursday decided to allow foreign investment up to 100 per cent under the automatic route in ‘other financial services’. RBI, however, said foreign investment in an activity that is regulated by an Act will be restricted to foreign direct investment (FDI) limits. Hence, sectors such as insurance, which already have pre-defined FDI limit (49 per cent in insurance) will continue to follow that. RBI said such FDI shall be subject to conditionalities, including minimum capitalisation norms as specified by the concerned regulator or government agency. In the financial services activities that are not regulated or are partly regulated by any financial sector regulator or where there is a lack of clarity regarding regulatory oversight, FDI will be allowed up to 100 per cent under the government approval route. ‘Other financial services’ will include activities which are regulated by any financial sector regulator, including the Reserve Bank of India,

The Goods and Services Tax Council, which will decide the GST rates, has discussed levying 16% GST rate on gold jewellery, cutting customs duty on gold to 2% from 10%, and levying 4% GST on gold bullion, two persons privy to the discussions told ET. If implemented, a buyer of gold jewellery will end up paying around 6 percentage more by way of tax as at present the total tax comes to around 12.5%, but the proposal will discourage smuggling as the cost to import gold will fall by 4 percentage points to 6% -4% GST and 2% customs duty. The move will ensure the Centre will not suffer any tax loss while states will get much more than the present 1% VAT on gold. Here's how. The Centre currently gets 10% through customs duty. If duty is cut to 2% and GST of 4% is levied on gold, half of the GST will go to states and Centre gets a total of 4% --2% GST and 2% customs.And when states collect 12% GST on gold jewellery (adjusting for input credit) revenue sharing will enable the Centre

Ensure all of you have a common grievance; new national forum verdict loosens rule In the past, many judges at the National Consumer Dispute Redressal Commission (NCDRC) did not allow consumers to file a case jointly because of a technicality in the law. But, a recent judgment by an NCDRC Bench has given some respite to such consumers, especially home buyers seeking relief against developers. If the amount in dispute is up to Rs.20 lakh, the law mandates individuals to approach district consumer forums. For amounts over Rs.20 lakh and up to Rs.1 crore, they need to seek relief from state forums. One may only approach the national forum or NCDRC, for amounts over Rs.1 crore. What if three flat owners, who individually paid Rs.50 lakh for a house in the same project, decide to approach a consumer court? While they don’t qualify individually, together the amount in dispute comes to Rs.1.5 crore. “Until now, only a few judges permitted such consumers to do a joint filing at the nat

Recently, many customers have got mails and messages from their banks to change the ATM PIN of their debit cards. We now know the reason, with reports suggesting 3.2 million accounts in five leading banks -State Bank of India, Axis Bank, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank and YES Bank -- are compromised. Bankers and cyber experts advise that ideally an ATM PIN should be changed every three to six months. Are they being overly cautious? Perhaps not. Several banks have already asked their customers to change their card security details and to stick to own ATM networks. According to Reshmi Khurana, country head-operations for Kroll Advisory Solutions, there are reports of customers reporting transactions on their debit cards in China, which is how banks came to know of the breach of data security. A certain foreign payment services company, whose system is believed to have been compromised, is going for a forensic audit. “While it is not confirmed, the breach of data seems to be on account of a

Seeking to minimise litigations over taxation, CBDT has come out with rules for computing distributed income arising out of issue of shares following buy back, demerger, amalgamation or bonus issue by companies. The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has introduced new Rule 44BB for computing amount received by a company in respect of issue of share for computing buy back tax payable. The rules take effect from June 1, 2016. The final rules provide for computation mechanism of 'amount received' in 12 different scenarios depending upon the manner of issue of shares — regular issue, amalgamation, demerger, bonus issue, conversion of bond or debenture, sweat equity share issue and share-buyback in demat form. The clarification with respect to the amount received by a company in case of ESOP or sweat equity shares is quite logical and would go a long way in rationalising the tax impact arising on buy back of such shares, experts said. "In absence of clear provisions in t

For longer tenure products, they offer higher returns compared to other instruments. But for shorter tenures, things are getting tighter for investors Despite the recent interest rate cuts in small savings schemes; they still remain attractive for retail investors. For the October-December quarter, the government has reduced interest rates by 10 basis points across the schemes. The one-year fixed deposit now carries seven per cent interest rate. The returns on two, three, and five-year deposits are 7.1 per cent, 7.3 per cent and 7.8 per cent, respectively. The short-term rates, up to two years, are almost on a par with those of all big banks. But in deposits over five years, small savings scheme scores. SBI offers only seven per cent on fixed deposits above three years. Among private banks, ICICI Bank and HDFC have comparable rates compared to Small Savings Schemes for tenures less than five years. But for five years or more, these banks offer interest rates of 7.25 per cent. How