ONGC, which is 30 per cent partner in Cairn India- operated Rajasthan oilfields, is obliged to pay royalty on entire crude oil produce from the blocks, even though its share is just 30 per cent.
Market regulator SEBI has not yet approved the open offer made by Vedanta Group to Cairn India shareholders, even as the target company formed a two-member panel to look into the offer made to minority shareholders.
British oil firm Cairn Energy Plc on Tuesday announced a second significant oil discovery in its Rajasthan block, where it had in January found India's largest field in more than two decades.
The company plans to begin drilling in Bihar's Gangetic basin by next year. It has completed the seismic surveys and is currently studying the data collected to understand the geological structures below the surface.
The $9.6-billion deal is contingent upon government nod as the deal involves change of ownership of strategic assets like the giant Rajasthan oilfields.
With Cairn Energy Plc voluntarily offering to meet government conditions, the Oil Ministry may find it difficult to nix its deal to sell majority stake in Cairn India to Vedanta Resources.
Cairn India has drawn strength from its Scottish parent, but also built new systems and processes to support its role in the country's oil sector.
ONGC, which is a 30 per cent partner with Cairn India in the giant Rajasthan oil field, had claimed that it had preemption or right of first refusal in Cairn India assets, like the Rajasthan block.
Cairn India, which found India's largest oil field in Rajasthan in over 30 years, has discovered a saline water reservoir near its oil field that will help pump crude oil to the ground level and enhance production.
Scottish explorer Cairn Energy Plc rejected state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corp's $200 million bid to acquire its oil and gas properties on east and west coasts of India.
Petronas of Malaysia has picked up about 10 per cent stake in Cairn India Ltd, the subsidiary of Scottish oil firm Cairn Energy Plc, that is to be listed on Bombay Stock Exchange by the end of next month.
British energy firm Cairn Energy Plc will invest $100 to $150 million to start production in the recent oil discovery in the Thar desert in Rajasthan, billed as India's largest on-land oil discovery in two decades.
Vedanta to file notice of claim in Cairn India tax case.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday indicated the government's intent to appeal against an arbitration panel asking India to return USD 1.4 billion to UK's Cairn Energy Plc, saying it is her "duty" to appeal in cases where the nation's sovereign authority to tax is questioned.
During a series of hectic talks between Cairn Energy and the Indian government over the $1.2-billion arbitration award in favour of the former last week, a slew of options was proposed by the two sides, including computation of capital gains and participation in the Vivad se Vishwas (VsV) dispute resolution scheme. The government is likely to go ahead and appeal against the arbitration award by a Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague before March 21, indicated finance ministry officials. Cairn Energy Plc on Sunday said it was hopeful that an acceptable solution to its tax dispute with the Indian government could be found to avoid prolonging and exacerbating the 'negative issue' for all parties.
Cairn joins a slew of multinational firms including Vodafone Group Plc and Royal Dutch Shell Plc that have been slapped with retrospective tax demands by Indian authorities.
The government on Tuesday confirmed that a French court has ordered the freezing of certain Indian assets in Paris on a petition by Britain's Cairn Energy, which is seeking to recover $1.72 billion from New Delhi after winning an arbitration against retro tax. Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary in a written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha said the government has filed an appeal against an international arbitration tribunal overturning levy of Rs 10,247 crore in back taxes on Cairn Energy. "Yes sir, an order has been passed by a French Court freezing certain Indian government properties in the case pertaining to Cairn Energy," he said.
The exploration company will buy back shares from January 23 and extinguish them.
Cairn files notice against India in $1.6 billion tax dispute.
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Cairn India said the company board has accepted Elango's resignation.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday said the rules that will lead to scrapping of the retrospective tax demands made on companies such as Cairn Energy Plc and Vodafone Plc will be framed soon. Parliament earlier this month passed a bill to scrap all tax demands made using the 2012 retrospective tax legislations. The bill provides for government refunding the retro tax to companies provided all legal challenges are withdrawn.
The Indian government has asked a federal court in Washington to dismiss Britain's Cairn Energy suit seeking enforcement of a $1.2 billion arbitral award, saying it had sovereign immunity under US law. Cairn had in May asked a US federal court to force Air India to pay a $1.26 billion arbitration award the firm had won in December. The government on August 13 filed a 'Motion to Dismiss' petition in the US District Court for the District of Colombia, saying it lacked subject matter jurisdiction in the dispute between Cairn and the Indian tax authority, according to a filing seen by PTI.
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The Union government's offer of settling the retrospective taxation case with Cairn Energy may hinge on Vedanta withdrawing the ongoing arbitration from the Singapore Tribunal on the same issue. The government has offered to refund Cairn Energy Rs 7,900 crore that it had collected under the retrospective tax demand on fulfilment of certain conditions, including withdrawal of pending litigation and furnishing of an undertaking to the effect that no claim for cost, damages, interest, etc., would be filed. This condition is also part of the Taxation Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2021, passed by Parliament recently.
Vodafone is facing tax liability over its $11 billion acquisition of a 67 per cent stake in the mobile-phone business owned by Hutchison Whampoa in 2007.
UK-based Cairn Energy PLC on Wednesday said it has agreed to drop litigations to seize Indian properties in countries ranging from France to the UK as it has accepted the Indian government's offer to settle tax dispute relating to the levy of taxes retrospectively. Meeting the requirements of new legislation that scraps levy of retrospective taxation, the company has given required undertakings indemnifying the Indian government against future claims as well as agreeing to drop any legal proceedings anywhere in the world. The government now has to accept this and issue Cairn a so-called Form-II, that will commit it to refund the tax collected to enforce the retrospective tax demand.
Britain's Cairn Energy Plc has dropped lawsuits against the Indian government and its entities in the US and other places and is in the final stages of withdrawing cases in Paris and the Netherlands to get back about Rs 7,900 crore that were collected from it to enforce a retrospective tax demand. As part of the settlement reached with the government to the seven-year old dispute over levy of back taxes, the company - which is now known as Capricorn Energy PLC - has initiated proceedings to withdraw lawsuits it had filed in several jurisdictions to enforce an international arbitration award which had overturned levy of Rs 10,247 crore retrospective taxes and ordered India to refund the money already collected. Two sources with direct knowledge of the matter said Cairn on November 26 withdrew the lawsuit it had brought in Mauritius for recognition of the arbitration award and took similar measures in courts in Singapore, the UK and Canada.
Cairn, which is sitting on a cash pile of about $3 billion, in a statement said its board has approved buying 17.09 crore shares or 8.9 per cent of the total shareholding, from open market at no more than Rs 335 apiece.
Moving quickly towards ending a retrospective tax dispute with a firm that gave India its largest oilfield, the government has accepted Cairn Energy PLC's undertakings which would allow for the refund of taxes, sources said. Meeting the requirements of the new legislation that scraps levy of retrospective taxation, the company had earlier this month given required undertakings indemnifying the Indian government against future claims as well as agreeing to drop any legal proceedings anywhere in the world. The government has now accepted this and issued Cairn a so-called Form-II, committing to refund the tax collected to enforce the retrospective tax demand, two sources with direct knowledge of the development said.
The Indian government has paid Cairn Energy Plc Rs 7,900 crore to refund taxes it had collected to enforce a retrospective tax demand, ending a seven-year-old dispute that had tarred the country's image as an investment destination. The company, which is now known as Capricorn Energy PLC, in a statement said it has received "net proceeds of $1.06 billion", of which nearly 70 per cent will be returned to the shareholders. The tax department had used a 2012 legislation, which gave it powers to go back 50 years and slap capital gains levies wherever ownership had changed hands overseas but business assets were in India, to seek Rs 10,247 crore in taxes from Cairn.
Issues related to the proposed free trade agreement (FTA) and bilateral investment treaty between India and the UK are expected to figure during the three-day visit of Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to London from April 8-10, official sources said. The minister will attend a host of meetings, including the India-United Kingdom Economic and Financial Dialogue, in London.
The levy of retrospective tax on the UK's Cairn Energy Plc is a tale of bizarre twists and turns that saw its attached shares being sold in May 2018 amid the passing of the baton from a full-time finance minister to interim one and the talks at the highest level to resolve the dispute, to claims that levy of back taxes was a result of an investigation into Panama Papers leak. The government late last month refunded about Rs 7,900 crore it had collected from selling residual shares of the British firm in its erstwhile India unit, seizing dividend and withholding tax refunds, to settle an eight-year-old dispute that had tarred the country's reputation as an investment destination. But, this did not come about easily. For seven years, the establishment vehemently justified in courts and outside seeking of Rs 10,247 crore in back taxes plus interest and penalty from a firm that gave India its biggest onshore oil discovery.
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.
Whereas, the group is offering Cairn India's parent Cairn Energy Rs 405 a share, which includes a fee for not competing with it in India, Sri Lanka and Bhutan for the next three years.
The government on Thursday brought a bill in the Lok Sabha to withdraw all back tax demands on companies such as Cairn Energy and Vodafone and said it will refund the money collected to enforce such levies.
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.
Petroleum Minister Ram Naik on Tuesday ruled out any increase in petrol and diesel prices in the run-up to the General Elections saying international crude oil prices have eased.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, in his Budget speech on Monday, announced a new dispute resolution mechanism for such companies who are in confrontation with the taxman's action.
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.
Cairn has already taken steps to have the arbitration award recognised in nine major jurisdictions such as the US, UK, France, the Netherlands, Singapore and Canada's Quebec province, where Indian sovereign assets have been identified. It hasn't said what it might go after but assets could include Air India's planes, vessels belonging to the Shipping Corporation of India and property owned by state banks.
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