Retrospective tax issues could be resolved before budget: FM

October 8, 2012   ·   0 Comments

NEW DELHI

In what may provide a further boost to investor sentiments at home and abroad, the Central Government, on Monday, maintained that there was no reason why addressing issues pertaining to retrospective amendment of income-tax laws should wait till the budget session in February next year.

To a query at the Economic Editors’ Conference here on whether a decision on the retrospective tax issue would have to wait till the budget for the next fiscal, Finance Minister P. Chidambaram said: “Once we take a view [on the Shome Committee report], I see no reason why we should wait for the budget session. We should move whatever changes have to be brought about in Parliament as early as possible”.

Shome panel

The Parthasarathi Shome committee was asked to recommend measures to deal with retrospective amendment of income-tax laws and suggest ways of treating taxation cases which involve indirect transfer of Indian assets, of the likes of the Vodafone-Hutchison deal in 2007.

Among other things, the Shome panel was also told to examine taxation of non-resident transfer of assets — where the underlying asset is located within the country — in the context of FIIs (foreign institutional investors) operating in India purely for portfolio investment and all non-resident investors. The committee submitted its final report to the Finance Minister last week.

“The Shome Committee report on retrospective legislation is under examination, and we would have to complete that examination quickly and take a view,” Mr. Chidambaram said while pointing out that the Finance Ministry, after taking the stakeholders’ comments on the report, would decide whether an amendment to I-T Act was necessary or if there were any other ways to resolve the matter.

“Resolution of the tax disputes, both pending and anticipated, is good for the country, good for the economy and good for investments. So, we must find ways to resolve the issue,” he said.

By Web Editor

Tags: budget, FM, report, session, tax, transfer