'Non-separation of religion from politics is India's most daunting challenge'
More and more states are organising investor summits, Jaitley said.
Agencies, whether public sector or private sector, may have to pay goods and services tax on the charges they collect on behalf of the government from clients. The authority for advance rulings (AAR), Telangana, has ruled that e-procurement transaction fee collected by an agency on behalf of the government is chargeable to GST, said Rajat Mohan, senior partner at AMRG & Associates. The AAR also ruled that neither services provided by the agency to the government, nor services provided on behalf of the government to the business entities are exempt from GST, he informed about the case.
The central government has told the Delhi High Court that citizens from different religions and denominations following different property and matrimonial laws is an affront to the nation's unity and the Uniform Civil Code will result in the integration of India.
Kerala Health Minister Veena George on Sunday said the health department will examine the reasons behind the death of the man.
'This individual's constant endeavour at self-glorification, even at the cost of both the government and the party, has the potential to subvert whatever genuine efforts that Channi has been making since he became CM.'
The central government has told the Delhi high court that it would examine in consultation with stakeholders the issue of formulating the Uniform Civil Code after it receives the report of the law commission.
The top court had on January 18 said the Centre will have a role in drafting the model community kitchens scheme and, particularly, exploring the possibility of providing additional food grains for it.
A 22-year-old man, who recently returned to Kerala from the UAE, allegedly died due to monkeypox on Saturday.
At the end of the day, Stalin expressing solidarity with an arrested colleague is one thing, especially if he too felt that the minister had been wronged, but for him to retain the person in office sets a bad precedent, which would not go unnoticed by voters, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
'Though federal, the Constitution is unitary in nature. All matters relating to revenue are centralised. It is necessary that matters related to finance have to be decentralised... States need more freedom in designing schemes with their interest in mind. There has to be a Constitutional amendment to give more powers to the states. A special session of Parliament should amend the Constitution, especially the 7th Schedule,' Kerala Finance Minister K M Mani tells Rediff.com's Shobha Warrier.
It underlined that anyone can catch the virus if they have had prolonged or repeated contact with an infected individual.
'We have reached a new low.'
With the Tamil Nadu electorate having given him an unprecedented mandate that had eluded his father the late M Karunanidhi, Stalin has to prove his worth, ensuring at the same time that the Dravidian drag on the AIADMK's side does not open up space for the BJP to make inroads in the state, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The Kerala high court on Wednesday extended till February 7 its interim order putting on hold the implementation of the Centre's bar on Malayalam news channel MediaOne's telecast.
The Centre will release Rs 95,082 crore as tax devolution to the states this month after including one advance instalment to help them push their capital expenditure, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Monday. After a meeting with all chief ministers and state finance ministers, Sitharaman said states had said that it would be helpful for them if the tax devolution is front loaded.
The Centre on Thursday decided to appoint a commission of inquiry into the "snooping" on a woman in Gujarat allegedly at the behest of Bharatiya Janata Party's Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi.
The NDA leadership is set to meet on Wednesday to discuss a Parliament floor strategy for what is expected to be a difficult winter session for the government.
The going is not going to be easy for the DMK and its allies in Elections 2024. Despite the seats sweepstake in the 2021 assembly polls, the vote-share difference of 5.6% (DMK's 45.38% versus AIADMK-BJP's 39.72%) is not insurmountable on a bad day, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
Union Ministers Smriti Irani and D V Sadananda Gowda have been dropped from Inter-State Council, official sources said on Wednesday.
Amid the continuing Patel quota stir in Gujarat, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat pitched for a review of the reservation policy, contending it has been used for political ends and suggesting setting up of an apolitical committee to examine who needs the facility and for how long.
The Centre has told the Supreme Court that West Bengal's power to withhold consent to the Central Bureau of Investigation is not absolute and the probe agency is entitled to carry out investigations that are being carried out against Central government employees or have a pan-India impact.
'At a time when the economic situation in the country warrants the closest attention of the government, India can ill afford a situation where the citizenry and the government enter into confrontation on the roads'
In his monthly Mann ki Baat broadcast, Modi noted that the country was also faced with several natural disasters, including cyclones, landslide and earthquakes, during the pandemic, and said more lives were saved than the past with the Centre, states and local administration coming together to carry out relief and rescue operations.
The DMK feels its genuine gestures have had no bearing on the governor's politico-administrative conduct, which is 'more political and politicised than administrative and Constitutional', observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Buffalo meat was on Wednesday back on the menu of the Kerala House in New Delhi and was lapped up by the lunch-time crowd as the items that were briefly discontinued following a row that saw police carry out a raid at the canteen were sold out within "45 minutes".
"As most of these agencies carry out interrogation in their office(s), CCTVs shall be compulsorily installed in all offices where such interrogation and holding of accused takes place in the same manner as it would in a police station," the bench said in its order.
Addressing the Inter-State Council meeting, convened after a gap of 10 years, the Prime Minister told the chief ministers that "we should focus on how we can make our country prepared to counter challenges to our internal security".
Taking strong exception to former West Bengal chief secretary Alapan Bandyopadhyay skipping a meeting of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, government sources on Wednesday said his conduct has made a severe dent to Indian Administrative Service and it could lead to anarchy.
Whenever the history of India's National Law Schools is written, N R Madhava Menon's name will be deeply inscribed in it, says Mohammad Zeeshan Ahmad.
'The JD-U has become an ideology-less accessory to the BJP,' says Ambassador Pavan Varma, who has been expelled from the JD-U.
Earlier, KCR had met West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee as part of efforts to build a non-Congress, non-BJP third front ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
The department of economic affairs, in its Monthly Economic Review for September, said critical reforms undertaken by the government will put India to a strong and sustainable growth path in the long run.
Four decades of federal evolution made India more secure, but coronavirus is reversing that. Modi's central government has tasted power again and is unlikely to give it up, notes Shekhar Gupta.
The Minister assured the House that security requirement of the Election Commission will be met for free and fair assembly election in the state.
The implementation of the GST will indeed be a landmark reform.
A BJP source admitted that a census will inevitably reconfirm the numerical majority of the OBCs. 'That will overturn social equations and consign the upper castes to a twilight zone of marginalisation. The RSS won't accept it.' Radhika Ramaseshan reports.
'Why should the state and Centre fight?'
The Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council, chaired by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, will likely consider on Saturday a GST rate cut for Covid-19 relief essentials and drugs for treating the black fungus disease and might leave the vaccines untouched. The meeting is being held following a report submitted by a Group of Ministers (GoM) to the GST Council on Monday. The GoM, set up by the Council on May 28, was mandated to look at tax exemption and concessions on various Covid items including vaccines, drugs, and equipment.
The panel's report also provides a range for fiscal deficit and debt path of both the Union and states and also recommended additional borrowing room to states based on performance in power sector reforms. Finance Commission is a constitutional body that gives suggestions on Centre-state financial relations. The report of the 15th Finance Commission was tabled in the Lok Sabha by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
