NATIONAL NEWS
Government accepts Cairn’s offer on retro tax; company to withdraw cases now, refund to follow
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. Following the issuance of Form-II, Cairn will now start withdrawing all cases in international courts. Once this is complete, the company will be issued a ₹7,900 crore refund, they said, adding the withdrawal of cases may take up to three-four weeks. While a Cairn spokesperson did not immediately respond to requests for comments, a senior finance ministry official confirmed the government accepting the company’s undertakings. Seeking to repair India’s damaged reputation as an investment destination, the government in August enacted new legislation to drop ₹1.1 lakh crore in outstanding claims against multinationals such as telecom group Vodafone, pharmaceuticals company Sanofi and brewer SABMiller, now owned by AB InBev, and Cairn. About ₹8,100 crore collected from companies under the scrapped tax provision are to be refunded if the firms agreed to drop outstanding litigation, including claims for interest and penalties. Of this, ₹7,900 crore is due only to Cairn. Subsequent to this, the government last month notified rules that when adhered to will lead to the Centre withdrawing tax demands raised using the 2012 retrospective tax law and any tax collected in the enforcement of such demand being paid back. For this, companies were required to indemnify the Indian government against future claims and withdraw any pending legal proceedings. Cairn on November 3 had stated that it has entered into undertakings with the Government of India in order to participate in the scheme introduced by recent Indian legislation, the Taxation Laws (Amendment) Bill 2021, allowing the refund of taxes previously collected from Cairn in India. Cairn’s undertaking furnished in Form No.1 under the rule 11UE(1) of the amended law have been accepted by the Principal Commissioner for Income Tax, the sources said. The August legislation cancelled a 2012 policy that gave the tax department power to go back 50 years 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 tax of ₹1.10 lakh crore on 17 entities, including U.K. telecom giant Vodafone, but nearly 98% of the ₹8,100 crore recovered in enforcing such a demand was only from Cairn. India issued Cairn with tax claims six years ago, and in December 2020 the company won an international arbitration against such demands.
Hyderpora encounter: Return bodies to families, says Gupkar alliance; LG orders magisterial probe
People’s Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD), an amalgam of Jammu and Kashmir’s regional parties, on Thursday met in Srinagar over the Hyderpora incident and resolved to help the three families to get the bodies of civilians killed in the encounter. We did not meet for any political process or to hold elections. All we want is to safeguard the lives of our people. We appeal to the people of Jammu as well that we are together to save the lives, Constitution, and institutions which should guarantee the security of the common man, Gupkar alliance spokesman M.Y. Tarigami stated. The meeting was held at the residence of Gupkar alliance chairman Dr. Farooq Abdullah. In case such incidents don’t stop and bodies are not returned, we will knock every door to raise our voice. Members of Parliament will also raise the issues in Parliament, Tarigami, a CPI(M) leader, said. The Gupkar alliance demanded that those involved should be dealt as per the law and the bodies should be returned. Those involved, irrespective of their position, are violators and deserve punishment, Tarigami remarked. Dr. Abdullah approached the administration to allow him to meet the families but permission was not granted. Burial [of the bodies] is not being allowed, citing several issues including COVID-19, security reasons, which is against the constitution, he added. National Conference vice president Omar Abdullah also held a sit-in in solidarity with the families, which were protesting and demanding the bodies. Meanwhile, Jammu and Kashmir Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha on Thursday ordered a magisterial inquiry into the encounter in Hyderpora, Srinagar, November 15 after three families claimed that the three deceased out of the four killed during the operation were civilians. The order came hours after the police removed the family members from a protest site in the city. A magisterial inquiry by an officer of ADM [additional district magistrate] rank has been ordered in Hyderpora encounter. The government will take suitable action as soon as the report is submitted in a time-bound manner. The J&K administration reiterates commitment of protecting lives of innocent civilians and it will ensure there is no injustice, a statement issued by Raj Bhawan read. There has been a growing public outcry over the incident. Earlier, in a midnight action, the family members and protesters who had gathered at the Press Enclave in Srinagar on Wednesday to demand the bodies of the civilians were evicted and the sit-in was disallowed by the police. The family members were seen being dragged and bundled into a police vehicle during the police action that was carried out after snapping electricity in the area. Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti said she was disallowed to come out of her residence to join the protest. Their narrative right from the start was based on lies to escape accountability. They don’t want to be held accountable for their actions and that’s why they are muzzling voices that speak up against such injustice and atrocities, she said in a tweet. She accused the police of arresting party leaders Najmu Saqib and Suhail Bukhari. They too have been arrested. The pattern of using innocent civilians as human shields and then denying their families the right to a decent burial shows that the Government of India has plumbed new depths of inhumanity, she stated. Sharing a video of the police action at night, National Conference vice president Omar Abdullah said, This is the ‘Naya Kashmir’ of 2021. This is how the J&K police fulfills the Prime Minister’s promise to remove ‘dil ki doori and Dilli se doori’. It’s outrageous that the J&K administration did not allow the families to conduct a peaceful sit-in. The Hurriyat, headed by Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, has called for a shutdown on Friday over the killings. Infant daughter, distraught mother protesting in freezing weather not for punishment to the killers but begging for the bodies for a decent burial is agonising, the Mirwaiz said in a statement.
Sexual intent of the offender, not skin-to-skin contact, forms assault: SC
The Supreme Court on Thursday quashed a Bombay High Court decision to acquit a man charged with assault under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO) solely on the grounds that he groped the child over her clothes without ‘skin-to-skin’ contact. The act of touching a sexual part of the body with sexual intent will not be trivialised and not excluded under Section 7 of the POCSO Act, a Bench of Justices U.U. Lalit, S. Ravindra Bhat and Bela M. Trivedi held. Section 7 mandates that whoever with sexual intent touches the vagina, penis, anus or breast of the child or makes the child touch the vagina, penis, anus or breast of such person or any other person, or does any other act with sexual intent which involves physical contact without penetration is said to commit sexual assault. Justice Trivedi, who authored the judgment, observed that the purpose of law is not to allow the offender to sneak out of the mesh of law. The court said limiting the ambit of touch to a narrow and pedantic definition would lead to an absurd interpretation. Image used for representational purpose only. The Bench said the most important ingredient in Section 7 was the sexual intent of the offender and not skin-to-skin contact. The conclusion that ‘sexual intent’ mentioned in the provision should be ex facie skin to skin would defeat the object of the provision. It would, rather than giving effect to the rule, destroy it. Justice Trivedi, speaking for the Bench, said when legislature had clarified its intent, the court should not introduce ambiguity. The court should not be overzealous in searching for ambiguity when the words in the section are plain. Someone can wear a surgical glove and exploit a child and get away scot-free… This is an outrageous order, Attorney-General K.K. Venugopal, who moved the top court in the constitutional capacity of his office, had argued during the hearing. The court, while setting aside the High Court decision, confirmed the guilt of the offender in the case and sentenced him to three years of rigorous imprisonment subject to the period he has already undergone. Venugopal had argued that the High Court order would set a very dangerous precedent and cripple the intention of the POCSO Act to punish sexual offenders. He added the High Court order had a deleterious effect when the number of POCSO cases had reached 43,000 in a year. On January 19, a Single Judge of the Bombay High Court’s Nagpur Bench created a furore by acquitting a man under the POCSO Act and holding that an act against a minor would amount to groping or sexual assault only if there was skin-to-skin contact. The High Court had concluded that mere touching or pressing of a clothed body of a child did not amount to sexual assault. The accused was sentenced to the minimum three years’ imprisonment under Section 8 of the POCSO Act. That was set aside by the HC and his sentence was reduced to one year under Section 354 (assault of a women to outrage her modesty) of the Indian Penal Code… This is very disturbing, Venugopal had submitted in the top court shortly after he mentioned the case. The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights had earlier asked the Maharashtra government to urgently appeal the High Court judgment. Several organisations, including the Youth Bar Association of India, represented by advocate Manju Jetley, had also moved the top court against the High Court judgment. The petitioners had said they were badly perturbed to note that the January 19 verdict contained several observations about the victim child’s modesty, which were both derogatory and defamatory. The child was even named in the judgment, the petition said.
Paytm shares make weak debut; tumble over 27% during day trade Shares of One97 Communications Ltd, Paytm’s parent company, on November 18 made a weak market debut and tumbled over 27% during the day from the issue price of ₹2,150. The stock was listed at ₹1,955, slipping 9% from the issue price on the BSE. It then tumbled 27.25% to ₹1,564 during the day. On the NSE, it debuted at ₹1,950, registering a decline of 9.30% against the issue price. During the day, the stock plunged 27.34% to ₹1,562. Paytm, the biggest IPO in India so far, debuted the secondary market on a weaker note as compared to our expectations of a flat listing, Santosh Meena, head of research, Swastika Investmart Ltd., said. The company commanded a market valuation of ₹1,01,484.00 crore in late afternoon trade on the BSE. Ant Group-backed Paytm’s ₹18,300 crore IPO was oversubscribed 1.89 times on the last day of India’s biggest share sale last week. This was greater than miner Coal India’s ₹15,000 crore offer a decade back. Paytm founder and CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma breaks down while delivering a speech during his company’s IPO listing ceremony at the Bombay Stock Exchange in Mumbai on November 18, 2021. Paytm, formally called One97 Communications debuts today at exchanges which saw a dull response and got subscribed only 1.89 times from the investors, which is much lower compared to the other recently listed companies, Parth Nyati, founder, Tradingo said. He added that they feel that due to the brand the company sought high valuation and it might see a correction in the near term. The initial public offering of Paytm’s parent company One97 Communications Ltd. received bids for 9.14 crore equity shares against the offer size of 4.83 crore shares, according to information available with stock exchanges on November 10. Paytm had fixed its IPO in a price band of ₹2,080-2,150 per share. Incorporated in 2000, One97 Communications is India’s leading digital ecosystem for consumers and merchants. It offers a range of services, including payment services and financial services. Launched by a son of a school teacher from a small town Aligarh nearly a decade ago as a platform for cellular recharging, Paytm grew rapidly after ride-hailing agency Uber listed it as a fast cost possibility.
Speaker Birla for action plan to increase sittings of legislatures
Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla on Thursday told an All-India Presiding Officers’ Conference in Shimla that there was need to prepare an action plan for increasing the sittings of legislatures. He was addressing the valedictory session of the two-day conference. We should try to make a definite action plan to increase the number of meetings of the legislatures so that we can provide maximum time and opportunities to the members so that the people’s representatives can discuss the major issues of their state and country extensively, he stated. He called for drastic changes to the functioning of standing committees, including changes to their rules. Presiding officers should evaluate the work of parliamentary committees once a year and make them more accountable to people. The tradition of zero hour should be started in State legislatures to give members the chance to raise urgent matters pertaining to their constituencies, he noted. Addressing the issue of increasing disruptions, he observed that the matter would be discussed with leaders of all political parties. The work of creating a single platform for all legislatures would be done by 2022. Speaking earlier in the session, Union Minister Anurag Thakur said a law was as good or bad as its implementation. Sometimes laws are passed, but the rules are not made for two or three years, he pointed out. The conference adopted a resolution that there should be no disturbance in the House during the President and Governor’s address and Question Hour. This will be discussed again with all the parties… It has been agreed in this conference that the smooth conduct of the legislatures is the moral responsibility of the presiding officers and all the MPs and MLAs, the resolution said.
INTERNATIONAL NEWS
US remains India’s biggest trading partner, India-US trade to surpass $145 billion in 2021: US Consul General
The US remains India’s biggest trading partner with trade increasing from approximately $20 billion in 2001 to $145 billion in 2019, said the US Consul General in Chennai Judith Ravin while addressing the United States India Business Council after the opening of the India-US Tech Conclave as part of the Bengaluru Tech Summit. The US-India bilateral relationship continues to be expanding from collaboration on mitigating the impacts of COVID-19 and climate change to space exploration. Both countries have a joint commitment towards a free and open Indo-Pacific region. US Consul General Ravin further said that US Trade representative Katherine Tai will be in New Delhi on November 22, 2021 to hold talks with Union Minister for Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal on expanding bilateral trade.
Israel PM Naftali Bennett likely to visit India in 2022
Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett is likely to visit India in 2022. Both countries are working on the tentative dates, informed Ambassador of Israel to India Naor Gilon. Meanwhile, Indian Chief of Army Staff General MM Naravane is currently visiting Israel. PM Modi and Israeli PM Bennett met for the first time on the sidelines of the UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow. They discussed the environment, defence, global, and regional issues. Both countries have also discussed Free Trade Agreement negotiations and will finalize it by June 2022. Former Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu had visited India in January 2018 where he met Indian PM Narendra Modi.
