News Highlights : 13 september 2016

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Arun Jaitley

CURRENT AFFAIRS SEP 13, 2016

01. CBDT launches online ‘nivaran’ to resolve I-T grievances :

CBDT has launched the ambitious ‘e-nivaran’ facility for online redressal of taxpayers’ grievances related to refunds, ITRs and PAN among others as part of its initiative to reduce instances of harassment of the public when it comes to complaints related to the I-T department. An exclusive ‘e-nivaran’ (electronic resolution) link has recently been activated on the e-filing portal of the department–http://incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in–where taxpayers can register their complaints through their personal computer systems and receive a special PIN number on their registered mobile and email, as their unique number to keep track of the issue. The ‘e-nivaran’ module, a senior official said, will work on the lines of the internet-based Income Tax Returns (ITRs) filing system and taxpayers can register all complaints related to delay in refunds, filing of e-returns, Tax Deducted at Source (TDS), PAN issues, and those pertaining to their Assessing Officer (AO).

02. UIDAI approves rules under the Aadhaar Act, to be notified soon :

After the getting the Aadhaar Act in place, the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has finalized the rules under the act with respect to enrollment, authentication, data security and sharing of information among others. These rules are expected to be notified in the upcoming weeks. Last week, Former IT secretary to the government of India, J Satyanarayana, was on 8th Sep 2016 appointed as the part-time Chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) which runs the ambitious Aadhaar project. Satyanarayana, who is a retired IAS officer was administered the oath by union minister for electronics and IT Ravi Shankar Prasad. The government also appointed Rajesh Jain of NetCore and Anand Deshpande of Persistant Systems as part-time members of UIDAI. "Approval of the regulations is an important landmark. These regulations contain procedures to ensure that enrolment, authentication, use of Aadhaar and data and privacy protection are strictly in accordance with the provisions of the Aadhaar Act. People can use Aadhaar to receive various services, benefits and subsidies directly from the government without any intermediaries. On the other hand, it will help governments to ensure targeted delivery of benefits to the deserving individuals and bring transparency and good governance in their systems", said Ajay Bhushan Pandey, chief executive officer of UIDAI.

03. Cabinet approves fresh duty concessions to APTA countries:

India’s decision to offer duty concessions on about a fourth of its traded goods to the members of the Asia Pacific Trade Agreement — China, Bangladesh, Lao, South Korea and Sri Lanka — was approved by the Union Cabinet on12th Sept 2016. “The Cabinet approved India’s offer on 28.01 per cent of dutiable national tariff lines (about 3,142 items) with an average margin of preference of 33.45 per cent under the fourth round. This will deepen the concessions being offered under this agreement,” an official release said. Margin of preference (MoP) refers to the percentage by which import tariffs imposed on products from partner countries in a trade pact is lower than the tariffs imposed on other countries that are not part of the agreement. Approval was also given to amend the preamble of APTA to allow accession of Mongolia as the seventh APTA member, the release added. APTA (formerly the Bangkok Agreement) is an initiative under the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific for trade expansion through exchange of tariff concessions among developing country members of the Asia Pacific Region.

04. Stressed assets: Most corporate defaulters fail to meet S4A standards

Most corporate defaulters won’t be able to resolve their bad debt issues through the Scheme for Sustainable Structuring of Stressed Assets, the latest stressed debt resolution mechanism from the Reserve Bank of India. Bankers are sceptical about going for the scheme as most of the companies are not eligible for the scheme with stringent guidelines acting as dampeners. According to bankers, though the aim of S4A guidelines is to strengthen the lender’s ability to deal with stressed assets, the eligibility criterion filters out many companies to be unqualified. “Right from the point of identification of the asset subjected to this scheme till the point of implementation is an arduous process and being untested lacks hardnosed trail,” says a CARE Rating report. The scheme goes by the thumb rule of certain parameters applicable to across all the sectors, but in real terms every sector has its own nuance of black spots inhibiting their growth, thus the current scheme does not address such issues but is primarily an another formulae-driven financial engineering tool. “With all the aforesaid factors, the actual implementation of the S4A tool and fructification of the expected results are yet to be seen,” it says.

05. Eleven Indian banks risk breaching Basel III capital triggers: Fitch

Eleven of India's banks will likely be in danger of breaching capital triggers with the coming increases in minimum requirements under new global banking norms, Fitch Ratings said on 12th Sept 2016. The rating agency previously estimated that India's banks will need $90 billion in new capital to comply with the Basel III banking rules, which are due to fully kick in by March 2019. State-run lenders accounted for 80 per cent of that amount. The Indian government owns majority stakes in nearly two dozen lenders who account for close to 70 per cent of the sector's assets. A surge in their bad loans and falling profits have discouraged many from investing in their shares or debt. Over a four-year period ending March 2019, the government has pledged to inject Rs 700 billion ($10.5 billion) into the state banks. The rating agency said that the end of June, the total capital adequacy ratio for 11 banks was at or less than the minimum 11.5 per cent required by end-March 2019. Of the 11, six did not have enough capital to meet the minimum required by March 2017, Fitch said. "State banks are the most at risk, given their poor existing capital buffers and weak prospects for raising capital through market channels," it said.

06. Government moving ultra-fast, April 2017 GST deadline achievable: Experts

With the government moving at “ultra-fast” pace on GST, the cut-off date of April 1, 2017, for rolling out the new indirect tax regime now seems achievable, tax experts said. With the Union Cabinet approving setting up of the GST Council, experts said that the level of preparedness at the end of state governments needs to be closely monitored. “There is no case any more for India Inc to remain in the ‘wait and watch’ mode. It’s high time that businesses roll up their sleeves to work towards creating a GST compliant internal set up by the go-live date,” said Rajeev Dimri, Leader, Indirect Tax, BMR & Associates LLP. He said the government is moving at “light speed” to meet the April 1, 2017 timeline. PwC India Leader (Indirect Tax) Pratik Jain too said that things continue to move at a rapid pace on GST front. It is encouraging to see that within four days of the assent of the Constitution Amendment Bill by the President of India, the government has approved setting up of the GST Council and the first meeting of the GST Council is to be held within 10 days of the Cabinet approval,” Jain said. He said implementation of GST from April, 2017 would be contingent upon the speed at which the GST Council is able to build a consensus on issues such as rates, exemptions, dual control etc. “The central government seems to be making all the efforts to meet this deadline”.

07. Centre forms committee to look into pay related anomaly:

A committee has been formed to look into various pay related anomalies arising out of the implementation of the Seventh Central Pay Commission’s recommendations. The 22-member panel will be headed by Secretary, Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) and it will have members from both the official and staff side. It has been decided to set up the anomaly committee of the National Council (Joint Consultative Machinery) consisting of representatives of the official side and the staff side to settle any anomalies arising out of the implementation of the Pay Commission’s recommendations, an order issued recently by the DoPT said. From the government side, it will have Member (Staff) Railway Board, secretaries of Department of Telecommunications and Department of Posts, as its members. Besides them, Financial Adviser, Defence Ministry, two joint secretaries from DoPT and another Joint Secretary (Personnel) in Finance Ministry will also be part of the panel. A Deputy Secretary of the DoPT will be Member-Secretary of the panel which has 13 people from the staff side, the order said. The Centre has accepted most of the recommendations of the 7th Pay Commission, to be implemented from January 1, 2016.

08. Instagram launches tool to filter ‘offensive’ comments :

Instagram on 12th Sept 2016 , announced that they are rolling out a custom keyword filter for the comments section on the image sharing site. Instagram users will now be able to choose words they do not want to see in comments on their posts. The filter will automatically hide them when a user posts a comment containing any of the blacklisted words. Announcing the new feature, CEO and co-founder of Instagram, Kevin Systrome said that as the Insta community grows, they want to make sure everyone continues to feel comfortable expressing themselves. “All different types of people — from diverse backgrounds, races, genders, sexual orientations, abilities and more — call Instagram home, but sometimes the comments on their posts can be unkind. To empower each individual, we need to promote a culture where everyone feels safe to be themselves without criticism or harassment. It’s not only my personal wish to do this, I believe it’s also our responsibility as a company,” Kevin wrote on the company’s blog.

09. Indian, Australian scientists partner to develop salt-tolerant rice :

An agreement was signed between the University of Tasmania (UTAS) and M S Swaminathan Research Foundation in Chennai last week for a $2 mllion project supported by the Australia-India Strategic Research Fund. They will conduct research on salt-tolerant rice varieties identified from wild species using biotechnology approaches in India and in Australia. Rice was one of the most important staple foods in the world, with 92 per cent of all rice produced in Asia, said Holger Meinke, head of the university’s School of Land and Food head. Production in this region was increasingly impaired by seawater intrusion or saline water tables rendering vast areas of land unproductive and threatening the livelihood of many rice farmers. “Researchers from University of Tasmania, supported by Tasmanian Institute of Agriculture, will be using a variety of wild rice that is capable of growing in highly saline coastal areas to identify and transfer traits that confer its remarkable salinity-stress tolerance,” Meinke said. “These traits will be transferred to traditional rice cultivars using a range of modern plant breeding techniques to create a salt-tolerant rice variety which will be suitable for growing conditions in India and other saline environments around the world,” Meinke added.

10. Arun Jaitley to launch portal for pensioners :

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley will launch a web portal for pensioners which will serve as a one-stop destination with regard to providing necessary information and speedy redressal of grievances. On September 14, Jaitley will launch a new Digital India initiative taken up by the Controller General of Accounts (CGA), namely, a Web Responsive Pensioner's Service Portal, a Finance Ministry statement said. This portal, developed by the Central Pension Accounting Office (CPAO), will provide a one-stop solution for pensioners to access information relating to status of pension cases, and pension payments processed by the Central Ministries/ Departments and the banks. "This service will also help in speedy redressal of pensioners' grievances," the statement added. The portal would be launched alongside the inauguration of the 'Mahalekha Niyantrak Bhawan' -- the new official premises of the Office of CGA -- by Jaitley on September 14. A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) will also be signed by CGA and the Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA), India, aimed at strengthening the internal audit function in various ministries and department