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The 48th GST Council meeting was held on December 17. The GST Council chaired by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman recommended to decriminalise certain offences under Section 132 of the Central Goods and Services Tax (CGST) Act, 2017. Some other recommendations, for the facilitation of trade, include an increased threshold of …

India’s net direct tax collections in 2022-23 surpassed the ₹11-lakh crore mark by December 17, reflecting a 19.81% uptick over last year’s, the Central Board of Direct Taxes said on Sunday. Last year, in the corresponding period, it was ₹9,47,959 crore. “The net direct tax collection of ₹11,35,754 crore includes …

In this era of globalisation, almost all nations are dependent on each other in the field of trade and hence rule-based freedom of navigation and security of sea lanes have become more important than ever for stability and economic progress of the world, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said on Sunday. …

Three of these countries (Nepal, Bhutan and Mauritius) are in the neighbourhood. There are quite a few Caribbean countries on the list such as Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and Trinidad and Tobago besides two Latin American countries (El Salvador and Haiti). …

Churchill’s definition of (bad) governance is applicable even 100 years after he spoke so sagaciously. One of the big achievements of Prime Minister Narendra Modi is that while administrative reforms are, usually, all about motherhood and apple pie proclamations such as “wash your hand before you eat”, he has turned …

Convened after a gap of six months, the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council on Saturday cleared what officials called a ‘pathbreaking’ move to decriminalise certain offences by taxpayers, with a higher ₹2 crore threshold for initiating prosecutions, except in cases involving fake invoices. Aimed at reducing disputes and chances …

Waste management is now a hot topic and Chennai has a range of private companies that offer unique solutions for different categories. Launched in Chennai in August 2020 with 100 households, Bintix now caters to 2,000+ households and collects 8,500 kg every month, a number that is steadily rising. Bintix …

The Union government is all set to ease grant of citizenship to members of six minority communities from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh whose passports and visas have ceased to be valid during their stay in India. The Home Ministry is expected to revamp the citizenship portal to accept passports and …

The results of a trial of an experimental cancer vaccine built on the mRNA (messenger ribonucleic acid) platform, made by Moderna and MSD (Merck&Co.), have shown promising results, media announcements claimed last week. Patients taking an immunotherapy drug Keytruda for advanced melanoma (a kind of skin cancer) were less likely …

The allure of quantum computers (QC) is their ability to take advantage of quantum physics to solve problems too complex for conventional computers. Several institutes and companies worldwide have invested in developing QC systems, from software to solve specific problems to the science that goes into expanding their hardware capabilities. …