The 47th GST Council meeting that is currently underway is slated to discuss a host of issues, including a mechanism for compensating states for revenue loss, tax rate tweaks in some items and relaxed registration norms for small online suppliers. Further, the meeting of the Council, chaired by the Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and comprising state counterparts, will also clear levying the highest tax of 28 per cent on online games, casinos and horse racing, besides, measures to curb tax evasion, especially devising ways to tackle high-risk taxpayers in GST. "The meeting is being chaired by Hon'ble Union Minister of Finance @nsitharaman and many important decisions are expected to be taken at the meet," PIB Chandigarh tweeted.
After Air India, Britain's Cairn Energy PLC plans to target assets of state-owned firms and banks in countries from the US to Singapore as it looks to ramp up efforts to recover the amount due from the Indian government after winning an arbitration against levy of retrospective taxes. A lawyer representing the company said Cairn will bring lawsuits in several countries to make state-owned firms liable to pay the $1.2 billion plus interest and penalties that are due from the Indian government. Last month, Cairn brought a lawsuit in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York pleading that Air India is controlled by the Indian government so much that they are 'alter egos' and the airline should be held liable for the arbitration award.
The National Stock Exchange (NSE), which is once again in the eye of a storm due to the co-location scandal, has said it has taken several transformational steps in the past few years on the regulatory, technological, and surveillance fronts to help improve stakeholder experience and to protect investors. Senior officials of the exchange briefed the media over the steps the exchange has taken on various fronts following changes at the helm with former managing director and chief executive officer Chitra Ramkrishna's ouster in December 2016. "Over the last few years, we have been looking to modernise and transform the entire value chain of technology.
The TVS family has been engaged, for more than a century, in a diverse range of businesses through various entities in which the branches of the TVS family have invested in or through T V Sundaram Iyengar & Sons, Sundaram Industries, and Southern Roadways - collectively referred to as the TVS Holding Companies.
'When we look at the quality of our retail loan book, the non-performing asset percentage is low.'
Gautam Adani on Tuesday said his ports-to-energy conglomerate never slowed or stopped investing in the country as the group's success is based on its alignment with the India growth story. Speaking at the annual shareholder meeting of the group companies, he said the previously announced $70 billion investment in new energy business will help turn India from being a net importer of oil and gas to an exporter of clean energy. "Never have we walked away from investing in India, never have we slowed our investments," he said. "We believe our scale, our diversified business, and our track record of performance positions us very strongly to continue to perform well in a variety of market conditions."
The infra-major going belly up cracked open some major flaws in the system - the most evident being weak corporate governance and how layers of corporate structures could be formed adding to the opaqueness of the group.
Under the new model, the surplus distribution in the participating policyholders' fund has been modified to 90:10 in a phased manner, wherein 90 per cent will go to policyholders and 10 per cent to shareholders. Further, 100 per cent of the surplus generated out of the non-participating business will be available for distribution to all shareholders.
Regulator Sebi on Friday imposed penalties on Reliance Industries Ltd, its chairman and managing director Mukesh Ambani as well as two other entities for alleged manipulative trading in the shares of erstwhile Reliance Petroleum Ltd (RPL) back in November 2007. Fines of Rs 25 crore and Rs 15 crore have been imposed on Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) and Ambani, respectively. Besides, Navi Mumbai SEZ Pvt Ltd has been asked to pay a penalty of Rs 20 crore and Mumbai SEZ Ltd has been directed to pay Rs 10 crore. The case pertains to sale and purchase of RPL shares in the cash and the futures segments in November 2007.
Most listed corporate entities in the country are in a fix. With the sudden declaration in late March of a nationwide lockdown to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic, the final calculations of their financial results for the year 2019-20 (FY20) are hanging in limbo. Till April 19, only 41 of the 3,947 companies listed on the BSE have managed to finalise the dates for the declaration of their yearly financial results.
Despite strong AUM growth, MFs lag behind other popular investment avenues. MFs received only 6 per cent of total household savings in 2021-2022.
Future group firms are convening meetings of their respective shareholders and creditors in November to seek approval to their proposed merger into Future Enterprises as part of the 24,713-crore deal with Reliance Retail. Several listed transferor firms including Future Retail, Future Consumer, Future Enterprises, Future Lifestyle Fashions, Future Markets Networks and Future Supply Chain Solutions - have informed their shareholders and creditors about the meetings which will take place on November 10 and 11. The meetings of the equity shareholders, secured creditors and unsecured creditors will be held through video conferencing /other audio-visual means, said Future group companies, adding that remote e-voting facility will be offered to all participants.
The e-commerce companies believe the government is using this exercise to take an unauthorised look into their financials, shareholding and operations.
Tata group companies have outperformed the broader market over the past four years, under the chairmanship of N Chandrasekaran. However, the group's fortunes rely heavily on the performance of Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) now, as compared to the past. The combined market capitalisation of the group's listed companies has nearly doubled in the last four years, against a 77 per cent rally in the benchmark Sensex during the period. The overall market value of 16 key group firms - excluding listed subsidiaries of such entities - stood at Rs 16.8 trillion as of Friday. This was close to 2x the Rs 8.45 trillion as of February 21, 2017 - the day Chandrasekaran took charge as chairman of Tata Sons.
Ahead of the second instalment of advance tax, the revenue department is scrutinising entities that have registered negative growth in their tax deducted at source (TDS) payments, even when they reported healthy advance tax payments. According to sources, taxmen have observed a mismatch in TDS payments from at least 60-65 small to mid-sized companies. Officials said it is unusual for TDS to not increase, given the improved turnover and profits - if higher advance tax payments are any indication.
The govt said the onus is on Pakistan to create such a conducive atmosphere, including by taking "credible, verifiable and irreversible" action to not allow any territory under its control to be used for cross-border terrorism against India.
Star Health and Allied Insurance's Rs 7,250-crore initial public offering (IPO), the third largest this year and eighth largest ever, just about managed to make it despite a poor response from investors, garnering just 79 per cent subscription, forcing the investment bankers to prune offer for sale (OFS) component. This is the second large offering after digital payments major Paytm this year to receive a lukewarm response from investors, a sign that despite the IPO frenzy investors are discerning when it comes to pricing. As Star Health didn't meet the profitability criteria, its IPO required a mandatory 75 per cent subscription from qualified institutional buyers (QIB).
China is engaged in hotly contested territorial disputes in the South and East China Seas. Beijing has also made substantial progress in militarising its man-made islands in the past few years, which it says it has the right to defend.
In a significant development, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) on Friday suspended its more than two-year-old approval for Amazon's deal to acquire stake in Future Coupons Pvt Ltd and also imposed a Rs 202 crore penalty on the e-commerce major for certain contraventions. This comes amid a bitter legal battle between Amazon and Future Group over the latter's proposed Rs 24,713 crore-deal with Reliance Retail Ventures Ltd (RRVL). Against this backdrop, Future Group had complained to the CCI.
The cryptocurrency industry on Wednesday urged the government to take a nuanced approach towards regulating crypto assets in India and asked investors in the country to remain calm and not arrive at a rushed conclusion, a day after the government listed for introduction a Bill to ban all such cryptocurrencies, with some exceptions.
There is money to buy the central public sector enterprises, but buyers will need a firm assurance that the disvestment programme will keep environment issues front and centre of their corporate plans.
'The government will take proactive steps to see that their participation in the equity market, especially in PSU stocks, is rewarding.'
Markets regulator Sebi has kept in abeyance the processing of Go Airlines' draft papers for an initial public offer worth Rs 3,600 crore. Go Airlines (India) Ltd, which has announced rebranding itself as 'Go First', filed preliminary papers for an initial share sale worth Rs 3,600 crore in May. The proceeds will be mainly used to repay dues. The "issuance of observations (has been) kept in abeyance", according to Sebi's latest update on processing status of Go Airlines' draft offer documents. The information was updated on June 25. In Sebi parlance, issuance of observations implies its go-ahead for the IPO.
The Madras High Court on Tuesday dismissed as not maintainable, a public interest litigation (PIL) petition challenging the organisational polls of the opposition AIADMK, where incumbents O Panneerselvam and K Palaniswami were elected unopposed as Coordinator and Joint Coordinator, respectively, of the party.
Given how everything has played out, Mehul Choksi, now 62, achieved all that he wanted but for all the wrong reasons, says Pavan Lall.
India Inc's philanthropic spends have grown by 3.62 per cent to Rs 22,000 crore in FY21 as profits expanded, and a majority of the allocations have been done to pandemic-linked causes, a report said on Tuesday. The report by rating agency Crisil said that while the first wave saw greater spending in cash largely through the PM-CARES Fund, the preference shifted to more direct support through in-kind spends in the second wave. Corporate contributed only Rs 85 crore to the PM-CARES Fund during the second wave between March and June 2021, as against Rs 831 crore to what was classified as 'others'.
This is the second time in less than six months that the fair trade watchdog has called for an investigation against the two entities after finding prima-facie evidence of violation of competition norms.
Nine lenders have exposure to the promoter entities and had taken listed operating companies' shares as collateral from the promoter companies.
However, the tender criteria demands that an entity must be eligible to conduct Beyond Visual Line of Sight operations in order to become eligible. Currently, no drone companies are eligible to do BVLOS operations, reports Arindam Majumder.
The RBI is of the view that it cannot carry out satisfactory due diligence for granting registration because the funding is from a jurisdiction that has been identified by FATF as having weak measures to combat money laundering and terrorist financing.
The immediate concern for all companies is to prepare themselves - and their vendors and suppliers - for the new GST return filing mechanism, being test piloted from April 1.
The amount of money lying unclaimed with the Life Insurance Corporation of India dwarfs the budgets of many ministries. There was Rs 21,539.5 crore which lay unclaimed with India's largest insurance company, according to details in the initial public offer (IPO) document it filed over the weekend. The regulatory documentation is ahead of LIC selling shares to the public through the stock exchange for the first time this financial year. This will be India's largest ever public listing.
No other corporate house in India is in a better position than Tata group for the takeover of debt-laden airline Air India, former deputy chairman of erstwhile Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia said on Thursday. Tata Sons has emerged as the top bidder for the takeover of the state-run airline but the bid is yet to be approved by a group of ministers headed by Home Minister Amit Shah. "You can't have a better corporate, with a better position than the Tatas, we can hand it (state-run airline Air India) over," he said while replying to a question in a virtual event.
The Zee saga will see a long-drawn-out court battle before shareholders get any chance to vote on any proposal by the management or Invesco, says Prosenjit Datta.
Changing tracks helps. But, not taking the beaten path isn't always helpful. This is the story of two of India's biggest privatisations - Air India and Bharat Petroleum (BPCL). Nearly two decades after the last privatisation, a landmark divestment concluded this year when the loss-making national carrier Air India was sold to the Tatas.
It said the searches that were launched on July 22 in nine cities like Bhopal, Indore, Delhi, Ahmedabad, Noida and some others are "continuing and further investigations are in progress."
Markets regulator Sebi and the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) are probing some Adani Group companies for alleged non-compliance with rules, the government told Lok Sabha on Monday. Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary in a written reply to a question said accounts of three of the six Mauritius-based funds, that have invested most of their money in Adani Group firms, were frozen in 2016 over the issuance of Global Depository Receipt (GDR) by certain listed firms. No freeze was ordered for their holding in other firms.
The date of implementation of the regulatory provision has been deferred to April 1, 2022, Sebi said in a notification without giving any reason for the move.
India's tweaking of IT rules allow formation of Centre-appointed panels, that will settle often-ignored user grievances against content decision of social media companies, Minister of State for IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar said, adding that this was necessitated due to the "casual" and "tokenism" approach of digital platforms towards user complaints so far.
FSN E-Commerce Ventures, which runs online marketplace for beauty and wellness products Nykaa, has filed preliminary papers with markets regulator Sebi to raise Rs 3,500-4,000 crore through an initial share-sale.