CA Online

Central trade union leaders on Wednesday refused to withdraw their nationwide strike call for September 2 to protest against proposed labour reforms, after their meeting with a group of ministers (GoM) failed to make any headway. The GoM, headed by finance minister Arun Jaitley, will meet the union leaders again on Thursday to break the logjam and deliberate on their demands, senior labour ministry officials told HT. The 12-point charter of demands include urgent measures for containing price rise through universalisation of the public distribution system (PDS), ban on speculative trade in the commodity market, strict enforcement of basic labour laws without any exemption or exception, and stringent punitive measures for violation of labour laws, among others. “There are 7-8 demands, which are agreeable and the discussion is an ongoing process….the government is positive about the demands (of labour unions). The meeting will continue tomorrow,” labour minister Bandaru Dattatreya said

CBEC says Sebi liable to pay as its services are not exempted from taxation Foreign portfolio investors, or FPIs, may have gotten off the taxman's hook on the issue of minimum alternate tax, but their regulator isn't going to be as lucky if the tax authorities have their way . The Central Board of Excise & Customs has backed the view of the tax authorities that the Securities & Exchange Board of India is liable to cough up service tax, in what will be seen as an odd spectacle of a regulator being asked to stump up money . In a clarification to a report put up before it by field officers, the government's apex indirect taxes body has given the go-ahead for a formal investigation in the matter, in the process backing the view that because services provided by the stock market regulator were not specifically exempted from taxation or kept in the negative list, they were liable to be taxed. Service tax officials will now closely examine Sebi's books to ascertain it

The government expects the number of disclosures on unaccounted overseas wealth under the black money window to go up in the last few weeks of the compliance period, which ends on September 30, Revenue Secretary Shaktikanta Das said on Wednesday. Business Standard, New Delhi, 27 August 2015

BSE proposes to market regulator the counters be dropped off; NSE also in talks The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) is considering delisting companies suspended on exchanges for more than five years, a source said. In a representation to Sebi recently, the BSE ( formerly Bombay Stock Exchange) proposed counters that had been suspended for seven years be delisted. The National Stock Exchange ( NSE), which has close to 170 suspended companies, is also in talks with Sebi. “Sebi has received the BSE’s proposal and is favourably considering it,” said a source. An email to Sebi did not get a response. “ We have made a representation to the regulator,” said an NSE spokesperson. “A suspended company that does not intend to remain listed cannot go through the reverse book- building exercise for delisting. There is a need for them to be exempted,” said asource. A merchant banker said Sebi had informally started allowing suspended companies to delist. “ If I approach Sebi with a pr

1.  CBDT has directed that Add Commissioner and Joint Commissioner of Income-tax shall perform the functions of AO under the Black Money Act, 2015. 2.  Addition cannot be made if no statement is recorded at the time of search. [Delhi ITAT: Smt. Rutu Jindal vs. ACIT] 3.  The finance ministry is in touch with the Empowered Committee of state finance ministers and state government to get the key legislations passed on GST by Sept 15. 4.  Date of service of order to be excluded while calculating time limit to file appeal. [Honorable Allahabad High Court: Rotomac Global (P.) Ltd. vs. CCE.] 5.  SEBI notifies norms for listing of start-ups on Institutional trading platform through the SEBI (Issue of Capital and Disclosure Requirements) (Fourth Amendment) Regulations, 2015. 6.  ICAI takes back its decision on mechanism to monitor tendering in the council at its 345th meeting held from 14th to 16th August, 2015. 7.  WTO committee of ICAI is organising conclave on Harnessing Global

The Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India ( Irdai) has asked insurers to give at least two months’ notice to customers before closure or relocation of their places of business. In its places of business regulations, Irdai said closure or relocation of the places of business within India by insurers would be after due consideration of all the factors, including possible inconvenience to policy holders. Business Standard, New Delhi, 26th August 2015

RBI feels Inflation Indexed Bonds are no longer the most vital measure of price; such bonds worth Rs 6,500 cr issued since launch The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has suggested to the finance ministry that the government buy back Inflation Indexed Bonds (IIBs) linked to the wholesale price index (WPI), reasoning that this is no longer the most important measure of prices. Such bonds worth . 6,500 crore have been issued since ` their 2013 launch. “We are studying the matter and will look at various options on how this can be done, either through the secondary market or some other mechanism,“ a government official said, confirming the central bank's suggestion. The central bank adopted the consumer price index (CPI) as the key measure of inflation last year and WPIbased securities haven't been reissued since then. Besides, wholesale inflation has been negative for the last nine months, reducing the attractiveness of the instrument. “There is a lot of pressure from some marke