GST COUNCIL
cheaper. While GST on pulse oximeters (including personal imports) has been reduced from 12% to 5%, taxes on hand sanitizers, temperature check equipment, and gas, electric and other types of furnaces for crematorium, including their installation have been slashed from 18% to 5%. Relief is also given on purchase of ambulances by reducing GST on them from 28% to 12%.
MS Mani, senior director at Deloitte India said that the shorter duration of exemptions would make it difficult for businesses to plan new investments and expand supply chains. “Businesses engaged in their manufacture and trading would hope that the period is extended beyond 30th September,” he said.
Abhishek Jain, tax partner at consultancy firm EY said that the council’s decision to bring down the GST rates on key Covid relief items would “reduce the cost of such critical Covid items for the end users”.
The GOM was constituted after several states demanded GST waiver on Covid-essentials. Other members of the GOM were Gujarat deputy chief minister Nitinbhai Patel, Maharashtra deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar, Goa transport minister Mauvin Godinho, Kerala finance minister KN Balagopal, Odisha finance minister Niranjan Pujari, Telangana finance minister T Harish Rao and UP finance minister Suresh Kr Khanna. the External Affairs Ministry will argue that Choksi continues to be an Indian citizen, they said.
Choksi, promoter of Geetanjali Gems and other famous diamond brands in India, had fled the country weeks before Rs 13,500 crore fraud in Punjab National Bank (PNB) allegedly involving him and his nephew Nirav Modi surfaced.
The affidavits, if admitted, will pave way for noted lawyer Harish Salve to plead Indian case in Dominica, they said.
His lawyers alleged that he was kidnapped from Jolly Harbour in Antigua by policemen looking like Antiguan and Indian and brought to Dominica on a boat.
Choksi was also brought before a Roseau magistrate, on the orders of high court Judge Bernie Stephenson, hearing the habeas corpus matter, to answer charges of illegal entry where he pleaded not guilty but was denied bail. His lawyer in London Michael Polak has filed a complaint with Scotland Yard seeking a probe into alleged abduction and torture of his client.
Polak said Choksi was removed from Antigua and Barbuda, where as a citizen he enjoys rights to approach the British Privy Council as the last resort in cases on his citizenship and extradition, to Dominica where these rights are not available to him. “The aim was to remove him from Antigua to Dominica to diminish his protection under the law. Choksi has ongoing proceedings in Antigua in regards to attempts by the prime minister to remove his citizenship, the only citizenship that he possesses, and to extradite him to India,” he had said. the transfer of the city’s police commissioner and the eventual resignation of the state home minister. Sachin Vaze, a former police officer, was accused in the case and dismissed from Mumbai Police.
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) arrested four people, including former Vaze for the Antilia security scare and the murder of Mansukh Hiran, owner of the Scorpio car. Hiran’s body was found on March 5 after it washed up in a creek in Thane.
The source of the Telegram message was traced to Tihar’s jail number 8 after which Delhi police was requested to join the probe. Police and jail officers then found two phones - one manufactured by Oppo and another by Vivo -- inside the cell. A team of officials from the intelligence bureau and special cell started probe into the claims.
The fear was that absconding and jailed IM leaders had come together to form a new terror group.
“Top operatives such as Riyaz Bhatkal, Iqbal Bhatkal, Amir Raza were never arrested. With almost all foot soldiers and key operatives of IM, such as Akhtar and Yasin Bhatkal behind bars, it is possible that the absconding leaders are using Akhtar and his social media skills to add strength to this new group. There is a possibility of Akhtar sending the Telegram message to divert the line of investigation,” an officer investigating the case said on March 16.
During the inquiry, police found that an Oppo cell phone, smuggled inside the prison, was used by other prisoners. Akhtar has used the Oppo phone to send the messages.
Akhtar was arrested from Naxalbari, Darjeeling in March 2014. Police said at the time that Akhtar alias Monu was the “operational chief” of IM and was heading the group’s operation, after Yasin Bhatkal’s arrest. The 30-year-old was convicted in the 2013 Hyderabad serial blast that killed 18, and charged in 2010 Varanasi blast that killed two, 2011 Mumbai serial blasts that killed 26, and 2013 Patna rally blast that killed five.
NIA is currently probing the case and sought an extension of the detention period of the five accused – former Mumbai Police personnel Sachin Vaze, Riyazuddin Kazi, Sunil Mane and Vinayak Shinde, and cricket bookie Naresh Gor. On Wednesday, a special court granted the agency 60 more days to file a charge sheet.