It is suspected that some portfolio managers at these banks, which have significant presence in Indian financial markets, could have helped their Indian clients to route their money back into India in disguise of foreign funds through use of investment vehicles across various jurisdictions.
A series of steps taken by the government to promote ease of doing business and liberalisation of foreign direct investment norms have helped India receive record FDI inflows so far this year, and implementation of measures like PM Gati Shakti, single window clearance and GIS-mapped land bank are expected to further push investments in 2022. Notwithstanding the global slowdown and the COVID-19 pandemic, total foreign direct investments into India rose to a record $81.72 billion in 2020-21. During April-July this fiscal, FDI (foreign direct investment) into the country increased by 62 per cent to $27.37 billion.
The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has initiated discussions with banks to address financial stress in the telecom sector, particularly Vodafone Idea Ltd (VIL) that urgently requires fund infusion to stay afloat. There was a meeting of DOT officials and senior bankers on Friday on the issue of Vodafone, sources said, adding that banks have been asked to look for a solution within the prudential guidelines. According to sources, senior officials from the country's biggest lenders State Bank of India and Bank of Baroda were also present among others in the meeting. More such meetings are expected to take place in the coming days, they said.
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Swiss authorities have begun questioning the soccer officials who were arrested in Zurich in May in a corruption scandal and are facing extradition to the United States, legal sources said.
India is believed to have challenged in a court in The Hague an arbitration tribunal verdict that overturned its demand for Rs 10,247 crore in back taxes from Cairn Energy Plc -- the second time in three months that it has refused to accept an international award against retrospective tax.
The Budget has relaxed a few safe harbour rules that aim to make it easier for fund managers overseeing offshore India-focused funds to relocate to the country.
India has got the second set of Swiss bank account details of its nationals and entities under the automatic exchange of information pact with Switzerland, marking a key milestone in the government's fight against black money allegedly stashed abroad.
Faced with prospect of its assets across the globe being seized just like Pakistan and Venezuela, the government decided to scrap retrospective taxation but the international embarrassment could have been avoided had 'attached' shares of Britain's Cairn Energy Plc not been sold, according to tax and legal experts. On Thursday, the government introduced a Bill in Parliament to scrap the tax rule that gave the tax department power to go 50 years back and slap capital gains levies wherever ownership had changed hands overseas but business assets were in India. The 2012 legislation was used to levy a cumulative of Rs 1.10 lakh crore of tax on 17 entities, including UK telecom giant Vodafone, but substantial punitive action was taken only in the case of Cairn.
Since arraignment under money laundering is a tougher offence, the CBDT hopes it will also overcome its dismal score sheet to prove satisfactorily to the courts that these cases were genuine ones of tax evasion.
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The Greens are calling for an urgent investigation.
Mauritius and Singapore account for the bulk of the $278 billion in foreign equity investments since 2000
Now, funds from Mauritius interested in India will have to weigh paying capital gains taxes that could range from zero to as much as 20 per cent
Courts in five countries including the US and the UK have given recognition to an arbitration award that asked India to return $1.4 billion to Cairn Energy plc - a step that now opens the possibility of the British firm seizing Indian assets in those countries if New Delhi does not pay, sources said. Cairn Energy had moved courts in nine countries to enforce its $1.4 billion arbitral award against India, which the company won after a dispute with the country's revenue authority over a retroactively applied capital gains tax. Of these, the December 21 award from a three-member tribunal at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Netherlands has been recognised and confirmed by courts in the US, the UK, Netherlands, Canada and France, three people with knowledge of the matter said.
Funds parked by Indian individuals and firms in Swiss banks, including through India-based branches and other financial institutions, jumped to 2.55 billion Swiss francs (over Rs 20,700 crore) in 2020 on a sharp surge in holdings via securities and similar instruments, though customer deposits fell, annual data from Switzerland's central bank showed on Thursday. The increase in aggregate funds of Indian clients with Swiss banks, from 899 million Swiss francs (Rs 6,625 crore) at the end of 2019, reverses a two-year declining trend and has taken the figure to the highest level in 13 years. It stood at a record high of nearly 6.5 billion Swiss francs in 2006, after which it has been mostly on a downward path, except for a few years including in 2011, 2013 and 2017, as per the Swiss National Bank (SNB) data.
A senior company executive said the company waited for seven years for the verdict and its shareholders needed to know when it would be concluded.
Indians continued their strong show at the fifth Commonwealth Youth Games, winning five medals, including two gold, on the second day of competition in Apia, Samoa, on Tuesday. Weightlifter Deepak Lather (boys' 62kg category) and javelin thrower Mohd Hadish won a gold each in their respective events, while Jisna Mathew won a silver in the girls' 400 metres.
Marking a key milestone in the Indian government's fight against black money allegedly stashed abroad, India will get this month the complete information on flats, apartments and condominiums owned by Indians in Switzerland as also on earnings made from such properties to help it look into tax liabilities associated with those assets.
OVL, the overseas arm of state-run explorer Oil & Natural Gas Corporation, and Oil India Limited agreed in June last year to jointly buy Videocon's 10 per cent interest in the Rovuma Area 1 for $2.475 billion.
Vodafone pleaded in High Court that IT department had no jurisdiction in the transfer pricing case because the said transaction was not international and did not attract tax.
Under Blatter, FIFA has handed its development money out strategically. Members of FIFA with only tiny populations have often received as much in grant money as those with massive populations.
Valuers have found almost no assets to pay for their claims against the Videocon group that entered the insolvency process in 2018. But the dissenters suggest that the money is elsewhere, possibly in the group's oil and gas assets, which are not part of the group's bankruptcy case.
Sepp Blatter faces months of troubles before departure.
The queries, sent in November, were mainly about Capital Investment Trust, which the I-T department said, was used for the purpose of transferring foreign funds comprising global depository receipts (GDRs) of the value of $400 million to two Indian entities - Reliance Utilities & Power (RUPL) and Reliance Port & Terminal (RPTL), owned by the Ambani family. A show-cause notice issued on March 29 to Ambani's wife Nita, and their three children.
Kochhar brothers stepped down from the board of Credential Finance by 2009. While Deepak Kochhar started NuPower Renewables, Rajiv set up Avista Advisory Group
Financial institutions at the risk of US sanctions as sharing of documents on SC directive amounts to violation of existing agreements.
The government may be waiting for the outcome of an arbitration initiated against its levy of Rs 10,247 crore retrospective tax on UK's Cairn Energy Plc before deciding on appealing against losing a tax case against Vodafone Group, sources said. An international arbitral tribunal is expected to give a decree within next few days on Cairn Energy Plc's challenge to the Indian government seeking Rs 10,247 crore in retrospective taxes. If the arbitration award in the Cairn cases goes against India, the government has to pay the British firm over Rs 7,600 crore to reverse the dividend and tax refund it had ceased and shares it sold to recover part of the tax demand.
Clever wordplay does not change the fact that the government is going pretty easy on some tax offenders, says Arup Roychoudhury.
The leaked list contains the name of Union minister Jayant Sinha, who responded by saying that the transactions were not done for any 'personal purpose'.
'The anonymous electoral bonds means that political affiliations will be even harder to ascertain for the voter or the minority shareholder.' 'The government of the day will, of course, know, exactly which corporate is making donations to which party.' 'Hence, the government will be in a wonderful position to exert "moral pressure" on corporates which make donations to Opposition parties.'
The funds officially held by Indians with banks in Switzerland now accounts for only 0.07 per cent of the total funds kept by all foreign clients in the Swiss banking system.
India has a double-taxation avoidance pact with Singapore and more than 85 countries.
It is important to clarify that availing of an exemption is neither evasion nor tax planning.
If India was able to provide additional and new information about people and entities that figure on stolen lists, they may consider it to exchange information
The I-T department said NuPower's balance sheet did not substantiate the high premium paid by Singapore-based DH Renewables for its shares, and suspects it could be a case of round-tripping of unaccounted income by NuPower.
Despite the Indian government's recent efforts anecdotal evidence indicates that there has been little change in the extortionist behaviour of a significant proportion of tax and police officials, says Jaimini Bhagwati.
The company's buy of Concur will strengthen its position in cloud computing
Occasionally, a whistle-blower releases sensitive financial data.
Percy Mistry says things at market regulator Sebi are also in bad shape.
The United States Soccer Federation said in a statement on the new charges that its hosting of the 2016 Copa America Centenario tournament would go ahead as planned.
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