MCA extends the deadline for conducting extra ordinary general meetings (EGMs) through VC/ OAVM/ Postal Ballot and passing of ordinary/ special resolutions, from 30 June to 30 Sept. 2020, provided the other guidelines of the framework, prescribed earlier, are adhered to.
Subject: Clarification on passing of ordinary and special resolutions by companies under the Companies Act, 2013 read with rules made thereunder on account of Covid-19 – Extension of time- reg.
This Ministry has issued General Circular No. 14/2020 on 8 April, 2020 and General Circular No. 17/2020 on 13th April, 2020 for providing clarifications on passing of ordinary and special resolutions by companies by holding extraordinary general meetings (EGMs) through video conferencing (VC) or other audio visual means (OAVM) or passing of certain items only through postal ballot without convening general meeting. The framework provided in the said Circulars allows companies to hold relevant EGMs or transact relevant business through postal ballots, as per procedure specified therein, upto 30th June, 2020 or till further orders, whichever is earlier. Requests have been received from the stakeholders for extending the period upto which the framework provided in the aforesaid Circulars may be utilized by the companies.
The matter has been examined and it has been decided to allow companies to conduct their EGMs through VC or OAVM or transact items through postal ballot in accordance with the framework provided in the aforesaid Circulars upto 30th September, 2020. All other requirements provided in the said Circulars remain unchanged.
This would substantially improve ease of GST compliance for over 22 lakh registered taxpayers who had to otherwise log into their account on the common portal and then file their returns every month.
In a significant move towards taxpayer facilitation, the Government has today onwards allowed filing of NIL GST monthly return in FORM GSTR-3B through SMS.
This would substantially improve ease of GST compliance for over 22 lakh registered taxpayers who had to otherwise log into their account on the common portal and then file their returns every month.
Now, these taxpayers with NIL liability need not log on to the GST Portal and may file their NIL returns through an SMS.
For this purpose, the functionality of filing Nil FORM GSTR-3B through SMS has been made available on the GSTN portal with immediate effect.
The status of the returns so filed can be tracked on the GST Portal by logging in to GSTIN account and navigating to Services>Returns>Track Return Status.
The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has notified new Income-tax Return (ITR) forms applicable for the Assessment Year 2020-21.
CBDT notified Income Tax Return forms of FY 2020-21
G.S.R. 338(E).— In exercise of the powers conferred by section 139 read with section 295 of the Income-tax Act, 1961 (43 of 1961), the Central Board of Direct Taxes has made the rules to amend the Income-tax Rules, 1962.
The principal rules were published in the Gazette of India, Extraordinary, Part II, Section 3, Sub-section (ii) vide notification number S.O. 969(E), dated the 26th March, 1962 and last amended by the Income-tax (11th Amendment) Rules, 2020, vide notification number G.S.R. 329 (E) dated 28.5.2020.
In essence, the following are the key changes:
House ownership: Individual taxpayers who are joint owners of house property cannot file ITR 1 or ITR4.
Passport: One needs to disclose the Passport number if held by the taxpayer. This is to be furnished both in ITR 1-Sahaj and ITR 4-Sugam. Hopefully, it will be made mandatory in other ITR Forms as and when they are notified.
Cash deposit: For those filing ITR 4-Sugam, it has been made compulsory to declare the amount deposited as cash in a bank account, if such amount exceeds Rs 1 crore during the FY.
Foreign travel: If you have spent more than Rs 2 lakh on travelling abroad during the FY, you need to disclose the actual amount spent.
Electricity consumption: If your electricity bills have been more than Rs 1 lakh in aggregate during the FY, you need to disclose the actual amount.
Investment details: Details of investment qualifying for deduction under chapter VIA with bifurcation of details of investment made during the period from April 1, 2020 to June 30, 2020.
A new schedule ‘Schedule DI’ has been inserted to claim benefit of investment/ deposit/payments made between 01-04-2020 to 30-06-2020 for the previous year 2019-20.
NCLAT quashes NCLT order to make MCA party in all insolvency cases as this will be not only excessive but perhaps counterproductive
The National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) quashed an order of the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLT) directing that the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) be made a party to every case under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) on Monday.
According to the appellate tribunal, the NCLT’s order, was beyond the power of the tribunal as it was tantamount to the imposition of a new rule in a compelling fashion
The impugned order making it applicable throughout the country to all the benches of NCLT is untenable and it suffers from material irregularity and patent illegality in the eye of law, said the judgment of the three-judge bench headed by Justice Venugopal M.
“The NCLAT ruled that the MCA need not be a party to all Section 7,9 and 10 applications, although they may be impleaded in certain cases based on exercise of judicial principles and following principles of natural justice. Although the MCA has been central in the implementation of the IBC, their being a party to every single IBC fillings is not only excessive but perhaps counterproductive,” said Richa Roy, partner at Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas.
In November 2019, the NCLT had directed the MCA, through its secretary, be party to all cases under IBC on the grounds that authentic records would be made available by officers of the MCA.
The Centre challenged the order arguing that such rule making was the exclusive domain of the government. It further said that authentic records could be furnished by the Registrar of Companies and certified copies could be made available for a fee.
The NCLAT order added that such “wholesale, blanket and omnibus directions” cannot be issued in a single stroke” and impleadment of the MCA can only be determined on a case-to-case basis.
The Reserve Bank of India on Friday announced a surprise 40 basis points repo rate cut in an off-cycle policy review. RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das announced the decision of the Monetary Policy Committee at a press conference. He also said that the GDP growth for FY21 is expected to be in negative territory
The RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das announced a slew of measures aimed at further easing the liquidity conditions and providing relief to borrowers just a few days after the government concluded unveiling its five tranches of Rs 20 lakh crore worth of stimulus.
Staying true to what he had said earlier, RBI Governor came out for the third time with a set of measures to alleviate distress in the economy. The interventions included announcement on policy rates front with the Monetary Policy Committee holding an out of- cycle review meeting and extension of previously announced relief measures for both industrial establishments and individual borrowers.
The RBI was expected to follow up with monetary-side interventions after the government announced fiscal measures to cushion the economy from the Covid impact.
Key Takeaways:
Liquidity support: The RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das announced a 40 basis points repo rate cut. The MPC voted, with five of its six members in favour, for a reduction of repo rate by 40 basis points to 4 per cent from 4.4 per cent. Consequently, the reverse repo rate now stands at 3.35 per cent.
Moratorium extended: A further three-month extension up to August 31, 2020 on the following:
Moratorium on term loan installments
Deferment of interest on working capital
Easing of working capital financing requirements by reducing margins
Exemption from being considered as defaulter in supervisory reporting and reporting to credit information companies
Extension of resolution for stressed assets, asset classification standstill by excluding moratorium period of three months.
Growth Outlook: On economic growth in the current fiscal, the RBI projected negative growth with a pick-up in growth impulses in second half. However, these depend on the trajectory of the pandemic.
Inflation Outlook: Headline inflation may fall below the RBI’s medium term target of 4% in third or fourth quarter of the current fiscal.
Demand & Supply: The governor said that the private consumption, which comprises 60 per cent of the GDP, has taken the biggest hit. Both the demand compression and supply disruption has taken a toll on the economy, the governor observed.
Foreign trade: Line of credit of Rs 15,000 crore for 90-days with roll over of up to one year so as to enable it to avail US dollar swap facility.
SIDBI: The special refinancing facility of Rs 15,000 cr to SIDBI at repo rate for 90 days for lending & refinance operations has been further rolled over for another 90 days at the end of initial 90 days period.
Income-tax refund of Rs 14,632 crore to 15,81,906 assesses and corporate tax refund amounting to Rs 11,610 crore to 1,02,392 assesses have been processed during this period, the CBDT said in a statement.
Income Tax Deptt. has issued refunds of Rs. 26,242 crores since 1st April 2020 to 16.84 lac individual/ corporate assessees. Further, the refund process has been geared up for necessary action to match the Aatma Nirbhar Bharat initiative (COVID-19) announced by PM/ FM recently.
CBDT Press Release dt. 22 May 2020
Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has issued tax refunds worth Rs. 26,242 crore to 16,84,298 assessees since 1st April, 2020 to 21st May, 2020.
Income Tax refunds amounting to Rs. 14,632 crore have been issued to 15,81,906 assessees and corporate tax refunds amounting to Rs. 11,610 crore have been issued to 1,02,392 assessees during this period.
It is stated that the refund process has been further expedited and refunds are being issued at a greater pace since the Union Finance Minister Smt. Nirmala Sitharaman’s announcement made in the Aatma Nirbhar Bharat Abhiyan last week. CBDT has released a sum of Rs. 2050.61 crore in the previous week ended on 16th May, i.e., between 9th to 16th May, 2020 to 37,531 income tax assessees and a sum of Rs. 867.62 crore to 2878 corporate tax assessees. During this week, i.e. between 17th to 21st May, 2020, yet another 1,22,764 income tax assessees were refunded Rs. 2672.97 crore and 33,774 corporate tax assessees including trusts, MSMEs, proprietorships, partnerships, etc. were issued refunds worth Rs. 6714.34 crore, taking the total amount refunded to Rs. 9387.31 crore in the case of 1,56,538 assessees.
Google will also leverage its advantage as a ‘data company’ and deploy technology as the key differentiator with expertise in areas such as Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning
Technology behemoth Google is investing heavily in people and partnerships to grab a larger share of the Indian Cloud market, as it takes on global rivals Microsoft, IBM and Amazon Web Services in the country, a top company executive said.
Google will also leverage its advantage as a ‘data company’ and deploy technology as the key differentiator with expertise in areas such as Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, said Karan Bajwa, the newly appointed managing director of Google Cloud in India.
“The technology is right. The brand is right. Google’s hiring great talent and putting the right people in front of the customers, and there’s very strong investments happening on the Google Cloud across the world, as well as in India,” Bajwa told ET.
Only 20% of workloads have so far moved to the cloud and there is opportunity in the remaining 80% which has yet to migrate to public or private clouds, he said.
The ongoing economic crisis unleashed by the Covid-19 pandemic will fast track the shift as more companies look at cost efficiencies, Bajwa said.
Although IBM and Microsoft have a lead over Google in the cloud business, that was not a point of concern, he said.
“For 80% of the companies, the journey will start now, so the fact that somebody is ahead and somebody is behind, I honestly don’t worry about it.”
As capital becomes scarce going forward, people will want to conserve every dollar. “It’s going to move to an operational expense from a capital expenditure. So, there will be a faster acquisition of customers…,” he said.
Google will build a “differentiated partner strategy” compared to rivals. It will also leverage on its huge reach due to its dominance of Search and areas like payments and advertising, he said.
Over the last 60 days, “digital natives” have been looking to optimise existing technology, and companies that have so far not adopted the cloud are opening up to the opportunity due to cost pressures, he pointed out.
“We’ve always seen that incumbency is a strong advantage, Google’s incumbency has built the business in most of these organizations where Google is helping these customers acquire new customers, get into new markets, grow revenues, grow margins, and that’s a very strong incumbency than anyone else,” Bajwa, who was earlier IBM India head and who has had a long stint with Microsoft as its MD of sales and marketing, said.
Google will bet on building a team that wins top customers and competes with the dominant players, he said. “By the time we are done with Covid-19, we will be bringing on board very senior people from the industry who have led organizations and who have very strong credibility. That makes a huge difference as customers feel comfortable with the people they are buying from,” he said.
Last week, Google appointed Microsoft veteran Anil Bhansali as vice president of engineering.
Google already has a tie-up with Bharti Airtel for its cloud business and the search giant also recently announced a second cloud region in Delhi, after it launched the Mumbai region in 2017.
“We would not be making these investments in the tens of billions of dollars if we did not think we would make money with customers,” Bajwa added.
Subject: Clarification on passing of ordinary and special resolutions by companies under the Companies Act, 2013 read with rules made thereunder on account of Covid-19 – Extension of time- reg.
