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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.

The income-tax (I-T) department will crack down on “shell” or “jamakharchi” (deposit and withdrawal) companies that are used as money laundering tools. The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) recently took a decision to focus on such companies as well as individuals and entities engaged in such activities, sources said. These operators have “laundered several hundreds of crores of black money and have earned commission income,” sources told HT. Kolkata-based tax authority , directorate of investigation, in its findings has said that a chunk of operators work from Ahmedabad, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Delhi and Bengaluru. “Principal chief commissioners of income tax Ahmedabad, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Delhi and Bengaluru have been asked to take a suitable action against persons who had laundered black money with the help of such operators,” sources said. According to the tax department investigations, these operators work through shell companies, which do not have any genuine business, and a

In a move that would reduce litigation in cases of disputes arising over compensation to workers, the Lok Sabha on Tuesday passed the Employees' Compensation (Amendment) Bill 2016 that would raise the cap on amount of compensation to be taken up by high courts. Section 30 of the Employees' Compensation Act 1923 provides for appeal in high courts whenever the disputed amount of compensation is more than Rs.300. The bill seeks to raise this to Rs.10,000, which may be further increased through a notification later. The Bill also provides for increase in penalty for contravention of the Act to Rs.50,000 from the current Rs.5,000.It may be later raised to Rs.1lakh. The Employees' Compensation Act, 1923, provides for payment of compensation to workmen and their dependants in case of injury by industrial accidents, including certain occupational diseases arising out of and in the course of employment resulting in death or disablement. It provides for making it obligatory o