The turnaround in business expectations, as indicated in the survey, gives credence to the belief that a new growth narrative is being scripted for the country based on improved business sentiment and investor confidence

in sales in Jan-mar 2017, as compared to only 39 per cent who experienced the same in Octoberdecember 2016.

On similar lines, 60 per cent of the respondents anticipate an increase in new orders during Jan-mar 2017 as compared to 41 per cent who witnessed the same in the preceding quarter.

Much of the recovery in business conditions is expected to be domestically driven as a large proportion of firms (61.8 per cent) expect to maintain status quo on their export orders in Jan-mar 2017. NEW DELHI: Truck booking startup Bookatruck looks to raise about Rs 25 crore in the third quarter of this fiscal to expand its presence across the country.

Bookatruck launched the app-based service for booking of heavy commercial vehicles in February this year.

The firm’s Co-founder Harshit Khetawat said it is looking to raise about Rs 25 crore in the third quarter of 2017-18. “We aim to reduce transportation cost by making trucking efficient and simple,” Khetawat said.

He said the company is a technology-enabled logistics service provider and offers a one-stop solution for all truck transportation needs throughout India.

“Through this service, one can also track the movement of the vehicle as they are equipped with GPS technology and we provide 24x7 customer care,” he added. Since its launch, it has seen about 1,300 app downloads, registered over 10,000 trucks and catered to over 100 companies.

Another Co-founder Manuj Khetawat said the app offers users the option of instant truck booking and realtime pricing.

It is currently available only on Android, but the founders plan to soon launch an IOS version as well. NEW DELHI: Individuals struggling to link their Permanent Account Number with Aadhaar because of differently spelt names can now simply upload a scanned copy of PAN to get the work done.

Besides, the tax department is planning to introduce an option on the e-filing portal through which taxpayers can choose to link the Aadhaar without changing the name by opting for a One-time Password (OTP), provided that the year of birth of the person matches in both documents.

With the linking of PAN with Aadhaar being made mandatory, individuals can log on to e-filing website of the income tax department or NSDL but the seeding cannot happen if the name is differently spelt in the two cards -- like use of full name in PAN and initials in Aadhaar.

In such cases, government has allowed a simple uploading of a scanned copy of PAN on the Aadhaar website.

The tax department will start educating taxpayers from this week through media outreach on ways to link the PAN with Aadhaar, an official said.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had through amendment to tax proposals in the Finance Bill of the Budget for 2017-18, had made Aadhaar mandatory for filing income tax returns and provided for linking of PAN with Aadhaar to curb tax evasion through use of multiple PAN cards.

The e-filing portal has already activated a functionality of linking PAN with Aadhaar. Over 1.08 crore assessees have already Aadhaar-linked PAN but the number is abysmally low as there are over 25 crore PAN card holders in the country, while Aadhaar has been issued to 111 crore people. As per statistics with the tax department, only 6 crore people file income tax returns at present.

The official said that linking of PAN with Aadhaar should not be cumbersome for people whose registered mobile number with the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) is active.

“In case the taxpayer is unable to link PAN with Aadhaar because of discrepancy in name, we are advising them to log in to the Aadhaar website, request for a name change and upload a scanned copy of PAN card as supported proof. This is the simplest way to update name in Aadhaar and only the registered mobile number has to be functional,” the official said.