The annual Finance Bill may soon become far less exciting as the government plans to lift the veil of secrecy surrounding tax proposals in Budget. Once the Direct Taxes Code (DTC) and Goods and Services Tax (GST) are in place, the finance ministry will adopt a public discussion approach for most future decisions, while confining the annual exercise to a few procedural changes.
US-based Purdue Pharma has filed a patent infringement suit against India's largest drug company, Ranbaxy, after the latter's wholly-owned US subsidiary, Ranbaxy Pharmaceuticals Inc, applied for marketing approval of a low-cost version of Purdue's pain relieving medicine, Oxycodone.
The Union finance ministry may have to battle it out in court with the sponsors of the Indian Premier League cricket tournament to make them comply with its service tax payment demands.
US watchdog lauds India's IPR efforts, but picks holes in legal framework.
Cipla, the country's leading drug maker, has sent a legal notice to George Washington University of the United States on a recent symposium it had organised in India.
Ranbaxy Laboratories Ltd, the country's biggest drug maker by revenues, has announced aggressive growth plans for the domestic market. It has increased its sales teams in specific areas like cardiovascular, diabetics and dermatology and plans to introduce over 100 new products by the year-end.
Fortune seekers in the Indian pharmaceutical space will find this irresistible. In less than 24 months, 26 blockbuster medicines, worth over $69 billion (about Rs 3,10,000 crore) -- or thrice the size of the domestic industry -- are going off-patent in the world's largest drug market, the United States.
With recent issues from state-run companies receiving lukewarm response from the markets, the government has downscaled its divestment programme this year, restricting it to a maximum of eight companies.
Rendezvous Sports World, part of the consortium that owns Kochi franchise of the Indian Premier League (IPL), may not be technically having the "sweat equity" that they claim to have.
After failing to convince states to keep petroleum products within the ambit of the proposed goods and services tax (GST), the Centre has finally relented. It has agreed to the proposal of the empowered committee of state finance ministers to keep petroleum products like crude, motor spirit, aviation turbine fuel (ATF) and high-speed diesel out of GST.
A senior official in the finance ministry said the Central Board of Direct Taxes addressed the nine areas of concern in the Code identified by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee.
The government has taken the first concrete step towards the introduction of the goods and services tax.
The levy had to come into effect from April 1. It would now be in force from July 1.
Discounts for retail investors may become a part of the government's disinvestment policy, instead of being offered on a case-to-case basis. The discount offered could be up to 10 per cent of the issue price.
US-based Eli Lilly has planned to continue its focus on innovation-driven products, instead of opening up to opportunities in off-patent generic drugs, being tapped by its larger competitors like GSK and Pfizer.
The government got Rs 9,930 crore from its follow-on offer of NMDC shares, leaving it short by Rs 1,448 crore for its year's disinvestment target of Rs 25,000 crore. In addition, it got about Rs 2.5 crore by way of interest income on the issue money from banks.
Pharmaceutical companies in Himachal Pradesh are queuing up to register new products at the drugs controller's office before the seven-year tax holiday window for hill states ends on March 31
PSB may get its first non-Sikh at the helm, vigilance clearances are awaited.
The government would fall short of its target for direct tax collections for the second consecutive year, with the revenue department estimating its direct tax receipts at Rs 3,70,000 crore (Rs 3700 billion) for 2009-10.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) plans to amend its rules to pre-empt non banking finance companies (NBFCs) from misusing the liberal rules governing limited liability partnership (LLP) firms.
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