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Business Standard Press Trust of India   December 22, 2017  In a move aimed at combating  black money  stashed abroad, India signed an agreement with Switzerland on Thursday that would allow automatic sharing of tax-related information from January 1 next year, the CBDT said. "With the completion of the parliamentary procedure in Switzerland and signing of mutual agreement, India and Switzerland are set for automatic exchange of information for the period beginning from January 1, 2018," the  Central Board of Direct Taxes  (CBDT) said. The policy-making body for the  Income Tax Department  said the agreement was signed by CBDT chairman  Sushil Chandra  and Swiss Ambassador to India  Andreas Baum  at the North Block here. A joint declaration for the implementation of Automatic Exchange of Information (AEOI) was signed last month between the two sides here and it provided that both countri...

Economic Times AFP, Dec 21, 2017 NEW DELHI: The International Monetary Fund on Thursday recommended India strengthen the independence of its central bank and bolster resources for its financial system regulators amid a bad debt pile-up at public banks.  Indian banks have some of the highest levels of debt of any emerging market, with the bulk of bad loans saddled in public-sector lending institutions.  This debt burden means that banks have been stretched too thin to lend for fresh investments, holding back growth in Asia's third-largest economy.  The IMF -- in its annual assessment of the stability of India's financial system -- said these conditions are testing the resilience of banks.  Larger lenders appear sturdy but "the system is subject to considerable vulnerabilities", the IMF said in its report.  In particular, a "group of public sector banks are highly vulnerable to further declines in asset quality", it added.  The IMF s...

Business Line Updated: December 21, 2017 Following is the chronology of events in the 2G spectrum allocation scam case in which a special court today acquitted former telecom minister A Raja and all others. May 2007 : A Raja takes over as Telecom Minister. Aug 2007 : Process of allotment of 2G spectrum along with Unified Access Services (UAS) Licences initiated by the Department of Telecom (DoT). Sept 25, 2007 : Telecom Ministry issues press note fixing deadline for application as October 1, 2007. Oct 1, 2007 : DoT receives 575 applications by 46 firms. Nov 2, 2007 : Then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh writes to Raja to ensure fair licence allocation and proper revision of entry fee. Nov 22, 2007 : Finance Ministry writes to DoT raising concerns over the procedure adopted. Jan 10, 2008 : DoT decides to issue licences on first— come—first—serve basis (FCFS), preponing cut—off date to September 25. 2009 : Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) directs C...

Business Standard Anup Roy December 22, 2017 The liquidity rush in the financial system since demonetisation has led to “unprecedented fund flows to both equity and debt mutual funds”, which is showing some signs of risk, according to the Reserve  Bank  of India’s (RBI’s) Financial Stability Report on Thursday. Given the significant increase in the  mutual funds  (MFs) corpus and an excess monthly return of almost 250 basis points (annualised) from a representative money market fund, “there seems to be some risk migration from the banks to the mutual funds”, the FSR said. The top five fund houses contributed about 50 per cent of the aggregate corpus of liquid and money market  mutual funds.  Since these funds invested in higher rated corporate bonds, the spread in these over central government bonds have contracted. However, there has been an unexpected rise in BBB corporate spreads on account of lack of liquidity in lower rated corpora...

India Today Geeta Mohan New Delhi, December 21, 2017  "It is noticed that on an issue as serious as designation of terrorist individuals and entities, the Council-mandated Sanctions Committees fail to make concrete progress and fall victim to narrow political and strategic concerns in some cases," India's permanent representative to the United Nations Syed Akbaruddin, said at the Security Council during an open debate on December 20 on 'Addressing complex contemporary challenges to International Peace and Security.' Hitting out at China and Pakistan, India raised the issue of designation of terrorists and how the former two have frustrated India's efforts at the UNSC 1267 Al-Qaeda Sanctions Committee against the designation of Masood Azhar, chief of Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) militant group, as a global terrorist. Akbaruddin also referred to what India now calls "mainstreaming" of terrorists such as Hafiz Saeed when he sa...

The Hindu By  Suhasini Haidar & Kallol Bhattacherjee DECEMBER 21, 2017 The dramatic vote came a day after a fortnight-long outreach by the Arab countries to India. Reiterating its traditional policy on the  Israel-Palestine dispute , India on Thursday voted for a negotiated settlement of the Jerusalem issue at the UN General Assembly with 127 other member countries. The dramatic vote came a day after a fortnight-long outreach by the Arab countries to India. Saudi and Palestinian envoys met diplomats from the Ministry of External Affairs ahead of the vote. Speaking to the media during the weekly briefing, the MEA spokesperson acknowledged that Arab diplomats held consultation with India on the vote and the Minister of State for External Affairs M.J. Akbar informed them about India’s traditional policy on Jerusalem. The meeting with Mr. Akbar took place on December 11 to discuss the U.S. position on Jerusalem and the Minister reiterated India’s posi...

The Hindu M.Govinda Rao C. Rangarajan December 22, 2017  We need to immediately move towards three tax slabs, and eventually two The  introduction of the Goods and Services Tax (GST)   raised much hope that it would herald the emergence of a ‘good and simple tax’ with ‘one nation, one market, one tax’. However, there has been considerable concern with the new tax, both in its structure and operational details, including the ease of paying the tax and filing returns. Trade and industry have been grappling with the problem of payment, filing the returns and claiming input tax credit, and exporters have been facing liquidity crises as the zero-rating of the tax has not worked and refunds have not been forthcoming, with difficulty in filing returns. Of course, the GST Council has been quite responsive to tweak the structure and operational details to make it simpler. Yet, considerable work needs to be done to ensure a smooth transition and to reap the revenue and ...

Dawn The Newspaper's Correspondent December 22, 2017 WASHINGTON: The United States could add Milli Muslim League and some other Pakistan-based groups to a list of organisations that use terrorism to promote their agenda, diplomatic sources told Dawn. The Indian media reported earlier on Thursday that the Donald Trump administration had accepted India’s request to label more Pakistani militant groups as globally designated terrorists. The request was made at the first India-US conference on designation of terror masterminds and organisations held in New Delhi on Dec 18-19. When Dawn contacted the State Department for comment on the reports that the United States could add more Pakistan-based groups to its list of terrorist outfits, an official said: “While Pakistan is an important partner for achieving US priorities in the region, this administration has also set clear expectations for Pakistan to take decisive action against terrorist and militant groups that operate ...

Business Standard A NI   New Delhi December 22, 2017 This special representative meeting is not only a high-level channel for the border issue discussion but also the platform for strategic communication. National  Security Adviser  Ajit Doval  and his Chinese counterpart state councilor  Yang Jiechi  will hold the next round of formal negotiations on the boundary issue later today. This comes almost four months after the 73-day-long military stand-off at the  Doklam  plateau in the tri-junction region. In the 20th round of special representatives talks since the establishment of the Special Representatives (SR) mechanism in 2003, Doval and Jiechi are expected to discuss ways to maintain peace and tranquillity along the 4,000-km-long border. The two representatives will also discuss the  Doklam  stand-off. Last Doval and Jiechi had met during the BRICS summit in Xiamen in September. Reportedly, the decis...