News

31st December, 2012 India along with many developing countries has proposed amendment to the WTO’s Agriculture Rules on public stockholding for food security purposes and for domestic food aid. As per the proposals, circulated in WTO last month, if a developing country government purchases food for its stocks or for its domestic aid, at administered prices in order to support low-income, r...

30th November, 2012 In an interesting case dealing with conversion of rupee loan into foreign currency loan, the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT), Bangalore upheld the orders passed by lower appellate authority and agreed with the reasoning of the Asessing Officer (AO).  The AO sought to verify the real nature of the expenditure and concluded that foreign exchange fluctuation loss as clai...

23rd November, 2012 Accounting codes for payment of service tax, interest and penalty have been changed. Descriptions as provided for earlier in the positive list scenario have been restored and made applicable to the new negative list regime also. Field formations under the Central Board of Excise & Customs had sought such restoration and is meant for the purpose of collection of statistics....

23rd November, 2012 The Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT), Mumbai, in its recent decision dated 6-11-2012 while considering the question of taxability of international shipping profits in India or Switzerland under the agreement for avoidance of double taxation and prevention of fiscal evasion with Swiss Confederation (Indo-Swiss DTAA), interpreted the terms ‘dealt with’ and ‘effectively c...

23rd November, 2012 The European Union has temporarily suspended implementation of its new tax on airlines based on their carbon emissions. The suspension must still be endorsed by the European Parliament and the European Council and it will be effective for a period of one year. This means that airlines will not be required to surrender their carbon credits for flights operating in 2012. ...

23rd November, 2012 Exclusive dealership agreements with group companies do not lead to anti-competitive business practices. The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has held that agreement between group companies cannot be said to be falling under the category of contraventions of Section 3 of the Competition Act, 2002. It was held that the principle is in conformity with the internationall...

20th October, 2012 The High Court of Delhi, in a recent order, examined some interesting questions on tax while deciding a writ petition challenging the order of the department under Section 179 of the Income Tax Act, 1961 (the Act).  In its order dated 11-10-2012 in the case of Sanjay Ghai v. Asst Commissioner of Income Tax and Ors, the Court observed that though it would not decide on quest...

16th October, 2012 The due date for filing Service Tax Return (ST-3 Return) has been extended to 25th November, 2012. The last date for the first half year (April - September) as per the rules is 25th October, 2012 but the Central Board of Excise & Customs has issued Order No. 3/2012 on 15-10-2012 extending the deadline. The return is required to be filed for the period from 1st April, 2012...

25th September, 2012 Several provisions of the America Invents Act have come into force from 16-9-2012 i.e. one year after the law was enacted. The provisions, among others, relate to post grant review, inventor's oath or declaration, supplemental examination, inter partes review and priority examination for important technologies. Leahy-Smith America Invents Act was enacted in September, ...

25th September, 2012 The Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court has held that Part I of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 will not apply to International Commercial Arbitrations seated outside India.  In an unanimous verdict dated 6-9-2012 in the case of BALCO v. Kaiser Aluminium Ltd., the Supreme Court has prospectively overruled the decisions given by it in the case of Bhatia Inte...

21st September, 2012 Answering a reference on use of class headings of the Nice Classification for registration of trade marks, the CJEU stated that the use of general indications of class headings referred to in Article 1 of the Nice Agreement is not precluded by Directive 2008/95, if it is sufficiently clear and precise. It also said that an applicant for a national trade mark who uses all ...

17th September, 2012 India has liberalised its Foreign Direct Investment or FDI Policy by increasing the limits in certain major sectors. The Ministry of Commerce and Industry, by its press releases dated September 14, 2012, has announced these changes including the decision to allow FDI in multi-brand retail trading. As per the policy rejig, FDI upto 51% will be allowed in multi-brand reta...