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Friday, October 29, 2010

ONLINE PANEL FOR URBAN CO-OP BANK (UCB) AND SOCIETIES

Dear Members,
 

The Co-operative department has shouldered the responsibility of preparation of panel for Urban Co-op Bank and Credit Co-op Society to the WIRC. The panel will be for three years and the additions of new members/firms will be made each year to this panel. The WIRC is coordinating this matter with Head Office. The members/ firms have to make the application online on www.meficai.org. The official announcement and further details in this regard from ICAI is expected to be made available during the next month before 15th November, 2010.

  
Regards,
-------
CA.C.V.PAWAR
Member of Western India Regional Council of
Institute of Chartered Accountants of India
The Chairman, Banking, Insurance and Pension Committee of WIRC of ICAI
0253-2319641. M-9423961209

Consolidation for Acceleration

INDIAN CA - NURTURED IN INDIA, GROOMED FOR THE WORLD

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Publishing of our Article GST- It must be better late than never!!

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: pradeep jain <capjain68@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, Oct 26, 2010 at 7:04 PM
Subject: NashiCAs Publishing of our Article GST- It must be better late than never!!
To: NashiCAs <nashicas@googlegroups.com>


Dear Professional Friends,

Goods And Service Tax (GST) has become a hot topic of discussion and
speculation miles before it is even near being effectively
implemented. We have written an Article on the recent events relating
to GST. Our article titled "GST-It must be better late than never!!"
has been published on various leading websites on taxes which are as
following:

1.      On Caclubindia.com
2.      On Tax Management India.com
3.      On CA Students Forum.in
4.      On taxguru.in
5.      On Articlebase.com

As knowledge increases by sharing, kindly send us your views and
thoughts on the topic. Your feedback is very valuable to us.

For the convenience of readers of this group, we are enclosing
hereunder our Article:


GST- It must be better late than never!!
Prepared By:
CA Preeti Parihar and
CA Rajani Thanvi
Introduction:-

"Continuity gives us roots; change gives us branches, letting us
stretch and grow and reach new heights." How truly it has been said.
The change is the need of time, change is innovation, but it becomes
arduous when it is not accepted by that people for whom it was made.
Whenever any change is about to come in our country it hangs in the
way cause of lack of cooperation. To change the system of Indirect
taxation Government brought a new system for implementation called GST-
The goods and services tax. It was heard that GST will bring a drastic
revolution in Indian Indirect Taxation system but the real picture
shows something else as it itself become a reason of struggle between
Central and states.

Need:-

Indian entrepreneurs are loaded with a number of taxes. Almost every
business transaction suffers a different tax. For services, it is
service tax, for manufacture it is Excise Duty, for sale within state
it is VAT, for inter-state sale it is CST, for income earned it is
Income Tax, for wealth created it is wealth tax, etc. These are mere
examples for the consultants, but for the businessmen, they mean a lot
of compliances involving a significant number of man power and money.
In order to relieve the businessman from some of the taxes, government
has planned to bring a composite levy – The GST which is said to bring
a tax-revolution in the country. It is said that the GST will simplify
the complex tax structure of the country and will replace around 16
central and state taxes including the service tax, excise duty, VAT,
etc. while maintaining a collaboration between the Centre and the
State.

Benefits:-

The main beneficiaries will be the business personnel. At present,
there are a no. of taxes governed by different Acts and rules. The
separate records are to be kept, separate returns are to be filed,
different dates are there for payment of taxes and filing of returns,
etc. which require a significant amount of man power and money.
However, the GST, when implemented, will replace many of the taxes and
will obviously reduce the paper work, man power and money. Further,
there are no. of ambiguities in certain cases which makes it difficult
to ascertain as to which law is applicable. For eg. software and SIM
cards are service or goods? The service tax department says it is a
service while the sales tax department says it is sale of goods. The
GST will resolve the issue. The Government too will be benefitted. It
is anticipated that the GDP of the economy will be increased by $500
billion and exports will also increase by 15%.

Beginning of GST:-

The Thirteenth Finance Commission, as constituted by the President on
November 13, 2007 to give recommendations regarding the Central-State
Fiscal relations during the year 2010-15. The Commission recommended a
model GST structure and also recommended a grant of Rs. 50000 crores
for its implementation. The recommendations were accepted in principle
and discussions were carried out between the Centre and State.

The Empowered committee of state finance ministers has released the
First discussion paper on GST on 10.11.2009 and it was proposed that
GST is going to be implemented on 01.04.2010 with its new developments
regarding unvarying tax rates all over country, removing cascading
effects of Cenvat and service tax with set off by making a chain of
set-off for hierarchy of Producer/manufacturer/service provider to
Retailer/End user level. For this purpose GST is to be introduced at
state level. But as history repeats itself Government had faced and
still facing intricacy of different opinions of states in the way of
implementation of GST. It is not an easy task to combine all the
provisions and demands of the states having different thoughts and
opinions. When everyone was waiting to greet with GST it was
recommended in Report of Task Force on GST that it will be postponed
till 01.10.2010 due to oppositions raised by states which is again
delayed by 01.04.2011.

In the middle:-

On oppositions made by states, Government presented a revised draft
bill of GST in order to arriving at consensus with the states. In the
revised bill Government has provided veto power to the Union Finance
Minister relating to state subjects matters on taxation issues. Then
after Finance minister had offered some concessions on major demands
of states relating to simplification of tax administration and
replacement of multiple levies of taxes like CST, VAT, Excise, Service
tax into a single tax. Government also proposed dual rate system to be
included in GST system but because of this new system states may have
revenue loss in initial year of implementation of GST. For this it was
cleared by the government for compensation to states for switchover to
the new tax regime including special incentives to those states such
as Punjab and Haryana for loss out of purchase tax. The Government
also agreed to exclude crude oil, petrol, diesel and ATF from the GST
structure on demand raised by states.

Present scenario:-

But as it was predicted this bill also comes in litigations between
states and central. The Empowered Committee of State Finance Ministers
on GST has rejected the constitutional amendment bill on 01.08.2010.
The BJP-ruled states, including Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh,
Himachal Pradesh and few others had opposed the constitutional
amendment saying that all powers of the states have been snatched
through the constitutional amendment. Chairman of the Empowered
Committee of State Finance Ministers commented on the constitutional
amendment that states were against infringement on their financial
autonomy and have certain reservation on the provision of draft bill
for the GST council and the GST Disputes Authority hence this draft
bill is not acceptable in this form to the states. However some states
were in favour of this amendment.

On coming of oppositions from many states, Centre has given up on the
matter of veto powers given to the Union Finance Minister. The veto
power has been withdrawn from the constitutional amendment bill on GST
with giving a statement that central FM had no any intention of
becoming the Super Finance Minister to interfere with the State GST.

In the latest meeting of state finance ministers and centre for GST,
held on 20.09.2010 many states has accepted the approach of new draft
of GST bill except few mainly Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh who still
have different viewpoint. In that meeting the Madhya Pradesh
government given an idea of an alternative model of the GST and BJP
rules states has supported to it. Also some other states have allotted
one month time for consideration to make their opinion on revised
bill. In the meeting the states has stressed on retention of their
rights and wished some more changes in the proposed Act.

Next what?

Recently, while addressing an interactive session organized by the
Merchants' Chamber of Commerce at Kolkata, the chairman of empowered
Committee – Mr. Asim Dasgupta, who is also the finance minister of
West Bengal; indicated that the ongoing conflicts between the states
regarding GST are about to resolve. The matter will be on board once
again on October 30, 2010; when the empowered Committee will meet
again. The points of dispute – the Dispute settlement mechanism of GST
and GST council constitution will be discussed therein.

Before Leaving:-

Government has to obtain categorical support of all the sates since
two-third majority is required for ratification of GST. But some
states ruled by BJP and other opposite parties are not happy on
implementation of GST. So it becomes a necessity for both Centre and
States to have consensus on GST very soon for bringing the GST in
actuality in 2011. But after coming of statement of Revenue Secretary
in this august that introduction of GST will miss the deadline of
April, 2011 it becomes unambiguous that the matter of GST becomes
political issue rather than an economical or legal one. It is ever
called that "Better late than never" so we can hope that the delay in
coming of GST will bring a fruitful result with it's implication. Let
we hope that GST bill will be presented in winter session and
political differences will shut down.

************

Kind Regards,
CA PRADEEP JAIN, (B. Com Hons., F. C. A.)

Friday, October 22, 2010

Charities-direct taxes code


On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 6:16 PM, Ramachandran Mahadevan <ramachandran_ca@yahoo.co.in> wrote:
 October 17, 2010

Charities in Direct Taxes Code Bill, 2010

S. RAJARATNAM
Share  ·   print  ·   T+  

Is there any change proposed in the Direct Taxes Code Bill as regards the concept of charity?

Reference to charitable trusts and institutions will be replaced by the expression non-profit organisation in the Code. But definition of charitable purpose in Sec. 2(15) of the Income-tax Act is the same under Sec. 103 of the Direct Taxes Code, 2010. Sec. 2(15) of the Income-tax Act, 1961, had undergone drastic amendment by the Finance Act, 2008, primarily intended to bar exemption for those charitable institutions with the objects of "advancement of any other object of general public utility", if they are in an activity charging cess, fee or any other consideration presumed to be business, even though such activity may be incidental to its objects.

The effect of the same may well be that institutions to promote Gandhian ideal of ahimsa, promotion of arts and music, promotion of language and literature, community centres, promotion of safe driving and road sense, animal welfare, promotion of sports, widow marriage, running a public park, running a newspaper, promotion of civic consciousness and promotion of research falling under the object of general public utility will all lose exemption, if they charge fees for some minor service or sell booklets pertaining to such objects, though incidental to such objects. The entire income including income from investments would also be liable for tax.

There have been representations for at least shifting the new restraints in the amendments from the definition of charitable purpose in Sec. 2(15) to Sec. 13, so that liability will be limited to such income from business sparing at least income from investments from corpus fund. This unfair amendment to law would be carried over in the proposed Code. There is need for review of this unfair provision in the new Code.

Will there be a change in the method of computation of income of charitable organisation?

The present law expects the method of computation to accord with generally accepted principles of accounting. But Sec. 92 of the Code would prescribe a method of computation.

While providing for cash system of accounting, it requires gross receipts as reduced by the outgoings to be adopted as income of the year. But then, gross receipts, as defined, will take into account voluntary contributions excluding corpus donations and loans, while including all the incomes from other voluntary contributions, income from business incidental to permitted objects like relief of the poor, education and medical relief, besides sale proceeds of capital assets. The permitted outgoings are expenses on running the charity, but excluding capital expenditure and amounts applied outside India unless permitted by notification. Since capital receipts are taken into account, denial of capital expenditure would not be in order, but such capital expenditure which is exclusively for earning income and those capital expenses matching capital receipts would be allowable, so that it should only be capital gains that should be part of total income. The unexpended income, which is permitted for accumulation for three years in Sec. 94(f) of the Code cannot exceed the limits of either 10 per cent of gross receipts or 15 per cent of total income, whichever is higher. There is relaxation of the earlier proposal in permitting accumulation for three years as against the present five years, which itself was reduced from ten years. The unexpended excess over this limit will be taxable at 15 per cent.

Are the conditions relating to investments and bar on any personal benefit continued in the Code?

The investment regulations under Sec. 11(5) of the Income-tax Act, 1961, are continued in Sec. 95 of the Code. Similarly, the bar against use of any of the assets or income for the benefit of interested persons under Sec. 13 of the present Act is continued under Sec. 97 of the Code.

Are there any changes in registration proceedings?

The procedure for registration presently under Sec. 12A and 12AA are repeated under Sec. 98 of the Code.

It is reported that there is an innovative provision for taxing the net worth of a charitable institution on its cessation or on its non-qualification as a non-profit organisation. What is its purpose?

Sec. 101 of the Code would provide for taxing the entire net worth of a non-profit organisation at 30 per cent, if it converts or merges with a form of organisation ceasing thereby to be a non-profit organisation or fails to distribute its assets on dissolution to any other non-profit organisation within a period of three months. The purpose is to withdraw the exemption, which had been allowed and which is presumed to be now part of net worth, as unexpended income.

It may be correct to withdraw exemption availed on amounts, when it ceases to be available for charitable purposes only if the entire net worth consisted of such exempted amount. Only that part of unexpended amount on which exemption was allowed and which is continuing as part of net worth and not the initial corpus or corpus donations or tax paid amounts forming part of net worth, should be vulnerable. There is no logic in taxing the entire net worth.

What is the treatment of anonymous donations?

Tax on anonymous donations in excess of 5 per cent of total donations or Rs.1 lakh, whichever is higher, is liable to tax at 30 per cent under Sec. 115BBC of the present law. This is to be continued under Sec. 100 of the Code.

There is a view that where business itself is held in trust or where it feeds the charity, such income should be exempt. Will that law continue?

The doubt on this point in present law is now proposed to be statutorily resolved under Sec. 102 of the Code so that business in any form would lose the exemption unless such business is incidental to the three objects, namely, relief of the poor, education and medical relief for which it is permitted.

How are public bodies and religious trusts and institutions proposed to be treated under the new law?

The Seventh Schedule of the Code lists the persons, entities or funds, which are not liable to tax. Organisations of public importance listed therein and those which may be notified by the Central Government are exempted under Sec. 90 of the Code. State funds like Prime Minister's National Relief Fund and public institutions now exempt like Coffee Board, Provident Funds and authorities created by the State or Central Act now exempt under Sec. 10 are listed for exemption under this Schedule.

As for religious organisations, regulatory authorities for administration of public religious and charitable trusts, endowments (including maths, temples, gurudwaras, wakfs, churches, synagogues, agiaries or other places of public religious worship) are exempt.

Entry 39 of the Seventh Schedule would exempt public religious trusts and institutions, subject to the conditions that they are registered under the Code and registered under the State Act, if any, and they apply the income wholly for public religious purposes, maintaining books of accounts and complying with investment regulations as are applicable for other charitable institutions without any benefit to any interested persons.

The main constraints on non-religious public institutions requiring application of income as computed in the manner specified in the statute within the specified time limit would have no application. Anonymous donations would also not suffer tax in the hands of such public religious trust.

How is the tax computed for a charitable institution?

A non-profit organisation which is denied exemption should ordinarily be taxable at normal rate as in the case of Association of Persons or a society.

If, however, it is a non-profit organisation recognised as such, but has not been able to utilise its income, subject to accumulation for three years, the tax could be at 15 per cent on amounts in excess of basic exemption limit of Rs.1 lakh vide para (C) of Part I of the First Schedule in the Code.


 

Sunday, October 17, 2010

Happy Dusshera


 Dusshera signifies the victory of good over evil.
 
 May all the evils in and around you vanish by the virtue of the goodness in and around you.
"Happy Dusshera"

--

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Special Finance Scheme for CAs-Corporation Bank

An Initiative of the Committee for Capacity Building of CA Firms and Small & Medium Practitioners

, ICAI …….

The Committee for Capacity Building of CA Firms and Small & Medium Practitioners, ICAI is set up to promote capacity enhancement of members and firms through Networking, Merger and raising core competency of CA professionals.

The Committee has taken a major initiative to arrange financial assistance to all members in practice / firms in the form of specially designed loan scheme through Corporation Bank.

Through the scheme, eligible Chartered Accountants can avail finance for setting up of offices including cost of furniture/fixture/office equipments-computers and other accessories.

 
 

 
Regards,
-------
CA.C.V.PAWAR

Changes in e-TDS Returns- Very Important [1 Attachment]


Changes In Q2 eTDS Statement Filing Requirements :

NSDL has notified changes in data structure and validations for filing eTDS statement for FY 2010-11. These changes are effective for the forthcoming second quarter statement filing due on Oct 15, 2010. The changes are primarily to give effect to Notification 41.

Changes 

  • 100% Valid PANs
  • Reporting of Transport Contract payments without deduction of TDS
  • Flagging penal rate deductions
  • Mandatory Contact details of Deductor
  • Reporting requirements for Govt Deductors

100% Valid PANs 

Existing Rule 

At present a minimum percentage of valid PAN is mandatory in any eTDS statement. This is 95% for Form 24Q and 85% for others 

Changed Rule 

Form 24Q/26Q/27Q 

  • All deductee records must have valid PANs. Even deductee records where tax has been deducted at lower/NIL rate must have valid PAN
  • Only exception is deductee records where tax has been deducted at higher rate u/s 206AA

Form 27EQ 

  • The existing rule of 85% continues

Reporting of Transport Contract payments without deduction of TDS 

Finance Act 2009 had made an important change in respect of applicability of TDS on transport contractors. Section 194C was replaced and the following two sub sections provided for non deduction of TDS on transport contractors 

(6) No deduction shall be made from any sum credited or paid or likely to be credited or paid during the previous year to the account of a contractor during the course of business of plying, hiring or leasing goods carriages, on furnishing of his Permanent Account Number, to the person paying or crediting such sum. 

(7) The person responsible for paying or crediting any sum to the person referred to in subsection (6) shall furnish, to the prescribed income-tax authority or the person authorised by it, such particulars, in such form and within such time as may be prescribed. 

  • In terms of sub section (7), now such transactions are to be reported in regular eTDS statement.
  • All such deductions to transport contractors where tax has not been deducted are to be marked "T" in the column Reason for Non-deduction / Lower Deduction, if any in the deductee details

Penal rate deductions 

  • All deductions where tax has been deducted at hiigher rate in terms of section 206AA are to be marked "C" in the column Reason for Nond eduction / Lower Deduction, if any in the deductee sheet .Such transactions need not have valid PAN. 

For records marked with higher rate only below  mentioned fields can be updated:

·         PAN 

·         Amount of payment 

·         Date of payment 

Mandatory Contact details of Deductor 

In the deductor details , contact details of deductors are provided 

  • Email-Id of deductor / responsible person is now mandatory
  • Field for mobile number of responsible person has been added.
  • Any one of the contact details of deductor is mandatory:

Deductor telephone no. along with STD code 

Responsible person telephone no. along with STD code 

Mobile no. responsible person 

Reporting requirements for Govt Deductors 

·        For TDS deposited by book entry, 7 digit number  generated by TIN for accepted Form 24G  statement to be quoted in BSR code field. This  value will be provided by the Accounts Officer to  the deductor. 

·        For TDS deposited by book entry, 5 digit number generated by TIN for DDO record of accepted  Form 24G statement will be quoted in Transfer  voucher field. This value will be provided by the  Accounts Officer to the deductor 

Form No 27EQ 

  • Form No 27EQ is to be filed for tax collection at source
  • Validation for no/lower/higher deduction will not be applicable for Form no. 27EQ
  • PAN compliance validation of 85% will be applicable for Form no. 27EQ

New File Validation Utility : FVU 3.0 

  • Quarterly e-TDS statements (regular and correction) upto FY 2009-10 should be validated with FVU version 2.129. There is no change in the validations for statements upto F.Y. 2009-10
  •  Quarterly e-TDS statements (regular and correction) for FY 2010-11 should be validated with FVU version 3.0.

Status of FY 2010-11 Q1 statements 

  • If statement for Q1  FY 2010-11 is being filed late , does it need to be validated with FVU 3.0 ?
  • The answer is Yes. it needs to be validated with FVU version 3.0. 
  • eTDS Statements are accepted at TIN-Centres by SAM software. Latest SAM will not accept any statement for FY 2010-11 , unless it is validated with FVU 3.0

1 of 1 File(s)

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

New NSDL FVU (3.0) - Important Instructions


Dear All,

 

NSDL has released two new File Validation Utilities.

Please ensure that you are using the latest versions of the software before going to the TIN FC for filing.

 

 For all e-TDS returns from April 2010 use the following FVU to validate the return:

Version: FVU 3.0

Download Link: http://tin.nsdl.com/downloads/e-TDS_FVU_3.0.exe

 

 For all e-TDS returns up to FY 2009-10 use the following FVU to validate the return:

Version: FVU 2.129

Download Link: http://tin.nsdl.com/downloads/e-TDS_FVU_2.129.exe

 

 Thanks


--
--------------------
CA Umesh Malvade
Chartered Accountant

Saturday, October 9, 2010

iT Matter October -2010

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: admin@zawarassociate.com

Dear Sir,

"Have a Great Day"

Please find the "iT Matter October -2010" We look forward to your valuable feedback/suggestion, as it will help us to improve & cover topics desired by you.

Regard

 

https://sites.google.com/site/cvpawar/announcement-files/OCTOBER-ITMATTER.pdf?

 

FOR ZAWAR ASSOCIATES

CHARTERED ACCOUNTANTS

 


Wednesday, October 6, 2010

The draft Bank Branch Auditors panel for the year 2010-11

Dear Sir/Madam,
 
This has reference to your application for the multipurpose panel for the year 2010-11. The draft Bank Branch Auditors panel for the year 2010-11, prepared thereof is hosted at the following link, for your ready reference.
 
We may inform that the hosted draft panel does not contain the following applicants:
 
In case, you have any query regarding any of the above, you are requested to register the same at http://www.meficai.org/complaints/complaint_enrty_enter.jsp
 
 
Thanking You,
 
Yours faithfully,
 
 
Professional Development Committee