Monday, 18 August 2014

Waste of Asbestos Cement Sheet wasn’t excisable as it had no commercial value and it dumped at facto

Excise & Customs : Broken or rejected 'Asbestos Cement Sheet', which is not retrievable and does not have any commercial value and is dumped inside factory to fill up ditches/roads, cannot be regarded as excisable item


AO couldn’t make exorbitant addition without considering purchases made by assessee from excise depa

IT : Where assessee trader procured liquor through excise department only, even if books results were to be rejected, reasonable estimation of trading addition was to be made


India In Advanced Talks For Gas Export To Pakistan

State-run gas utilities from India and Pakistan are in advanced talks for export of gas via a pipeline running from Jalandhar in India to the Attari border and to Lahore in Pakistan.


Negotiations between the sides on commercial aspects of the gas export are at an advanced stage, a petroleum ministry official said.


While Pakistan has been asking India to re-consider the proposed gas price, India has sought sovereign payment guarantees before entering into any contract.


Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan informed parliament earlier this month that negotiations are underway between GAIL India and the Inter State Gas Systems (ISGS) of Pakistan for supply of five million metric standard cubic metres a day (MMSCMD) of lean gas to Pakistan for a period of five years.


Under this proposal, GAIL would lay 110 km pipeline from Jalandhar to the Amritsar-Attari border. The technical feasibility of laying the gas line up to Lahore has already been ironed out after five rounds of negotiations between both sides.


Liquefied natural gas, or LNG, will be imported through terminals in Maharashtra or Gujarat and then moved through GAIL`s existing pipeline network up to Jalandhar. LNG would be gasified by the Indian side as Pakistan does not have an LNG import facility.


LNG imports into India are currently in the range of USD 13-14 per million British thermal units (mbtu) and after including customs or import duty, pipeline transportation charges and local taxes, the delivered price will be close to USD 21 per mbtu.


Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in his budget speech last month did not mention the bit on concession in gas exports to Pakistan, but included it in the relevant documents.


"Exemption from basic customs duty is being granted on re-gasified LNG (liquefied natural gas) for supply to Pakistan," said the relevant section pertaining to the amendments in the Customs Act.


The basic customs duty stood at 5 percent before.


India, on its part, has sought sovereign payment guarantees from Pakistan, including sureties for three months` payment and advance termination commitments, the official said.


The pipeline project is also being seen as a feasibility study for the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline project through which both India and Pakistan propose to import LNG from the central Asian region.


Source:- zeenews.india.com





Finmin Imposes Safeguard Duty On Import Of Seamless Pipes, Tubes

To provide relief to domestic producers, the Government has imposed safeguard duty on the import of seamless pipes and tubes, which are used in equipment for power generation, oil exploration, and bearing industry, besides others.


BHEL, ONGC and Oil India are among the largest consumers of such products, while Jindal Saw and ISMT Ltd are key domestic producers of these products. BHEL also produces these products to meet part of its requirement.


Decision to impose safeguard duty has been taken on the basis of petition filed by the domestic producers. Safeguard and anti-dumping duty are imposed in cases where there is a fear that excessive or cheap import will harm the domestic industry.


Safeguard duty is imposed on import from a group of countries, while anti-dumping duty is levied on import from one particular country.


According to a notification issued by the Central Board of Excise and Custom (CBEC), safeguard duty will be imposed at the rate of 20 per cent in the first year (August 13, 2014-August 12, 2015), 10 per cent in the second year (August 13, 2015-August 12, 2016) and at the rate of 5 per cent in the third year (August 13, 2016-February 12, 2017). This will not be applicable on imports from developing countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and South Africa, besides others.


The duty has been imposed after a detailed study by the Director-General (Safeguard) which pointed out that increased imports from China and other countries have caused adversely impacted the domestic producers.


There were also allegations that despite increase in the price of raw materials, importers were bringing their product at cheaper price, which was affecting the domestic industry.


According to the DG (Safeguard) final report, BHEL in its argument opposing the duty imposition, had said that its total requirement is 50-60 thousand tonne. Out of this, half of the requirement is met through captive production, while the remaining is procured from domestic and foreign companies on the basis of competitive bidding. The company’s average annual import bill is around ? 160 crore.


For, ONGC, the annual import bill for such products is little more than 2 per cent (based on the data of (2012-13 as mentioned in the annual report). Both ONGC and BHEL apprehended that imposition of safeguard will impact them financially.


The DG in its report did acknowledge this fact, but also said that a strong and robust domestic industry is also a requirement which can fulfil the needs of the domestic market and can grow in tandem and in competition to foreign suppliers.


Source:- thehindubusinessline.com





Gold Seizures Soar To Rs 678 Crore In 2013-14

With import restrictions in place, gold smuggling has witnessed a spurt during 2013-14 as indicated by the value of precious metal seized rising to Rs 678 crore, up from Rs 94 crore a year ago.


Most of the seizures of illegal gold were made at airports in Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai and Calicut, according to the information provided by the CBEC and Directorate of Revenue Intelligence to the Finance Ministry.


In 2013-14 fiscal, the Customs department has detected 2,419 cases of seizures with value of Rs 678 crore. In 2012-13, they had detected 919 cases with the value of gold seized at Rs 94 crore.


In the first three months (April-June) of current fiscal, 1,264 cases of smuggling were detected and value of gold seized was Rs 354 crore, which is more than half of the total amount seized during full 2013-14 fiscal.


The data shows that in the month of June, the quantity of gold seized was Rs 464 kgs, in May and April it was 362 kg and 461 kg, respectively.


In order to check the rising CAD, the government raised import duty on the yellow metal in three phases to 10 per cent in 2013, while RBI imposed curbs on import of gold and also laid down various pre-conditions for inward shipments of the precious metal.


The Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) has already communicated to the field formations to be alert and to keep a close watch on the trend of smuggling of gold.


Current Account Deficit (CAD), which is the excess of foreign exchange outflows over inflows, touched a historic high of $88 billion, or 4.7 per cent of GDP in 2012-13, mainly due to rising imports of gold and petroleum products.


CAD came down to $32.4 billion or 1.7 per cent of GDP in 2013-14.India is the largest importer of gold, which is mainly utilised to meet the demands of the jewellery industry.


Source:- economictimes.indiatimes.com





Rupee Edges Higher On Dollar Inflows

The rupee was trading higher at 60.66 versus Thursday's close of 60.77. Bunched-up dollar inflows were hurting the pair, said traders.


Foreign exchange markets were closed on Friday and Monday for holidays.The Sensex and Nifty hit record highs on Monday and were trading up 0.4 per cent as of 9:29 a.m.


Dollar's gains versus certain other Asian units and majors to limited a sharp fall in the USD/INR pair.Index of the dollar versus six majors was up 0.05 per cent. The rupee is seen trading in 60.50 to 61.00 range during the session.


Source:- profit.ndtv.com





No denial of credit on goods procured from registered dealer due to non-supply of goods to it by man

Cenvat Credit : As long as assessee has procured goods from registered dealer, fact of manufacturer of inputs having not supplied goods to registered dealer, will not result in denial of credit to input receiver


Secondment of employee by group Co. to Indian affiliate for managerial services constitutes its serv

IT/ILT: Where in terms of licence agreement entered into between assessee, a UK based company, and its Indian group concern, certain employees were seconded to Indian company to render services relating to manufacturing of Excavator loader in India, in view of fact that seconded employees furnished services including managerial services for a period of more than 90 days during relevant assessment years, Assessing Officer rightly concluded that service PE of assessee was established in India in t


HC set aside penalty as there were insufficient evidences to establish nexus of forex unearthed with

FERA/FEMA: Order imposing penalty is to be set aside if sufficient evidence is not shown to establish relationship of person penalised with foreign exchange recovered