abhyaas law bulletin - april 2012

8/2/2019 Abhyaas Law Bulletin - April 2012

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bhyaas Law Bulletin …For the quintessential CLAT aspirant

pril 10th 2012 ALB20120404

The Editor’s Column

Dear Student,

Welcome to the April edition of the Abhyaas Law

Bulletin. Army Chief Gen V.K. Singh’s claim that he

was offered a 14 crore bribe created quite a storm.

While the opposition demanded a CBI probe, the

ruling party was unhappy with the General’s publicspeak. The letter written by the general to PM

Manmohan Singh also got leaked to the media. Many

parties demanded the sacking of the Army chief while

the Government was looking to end this stand off.

Both the General and Defense minister clarified that

there is no bad blood between the Army and the

Government.

Both the Railway Budget and Union Budget were

presented in the Parliament. The hike of railway

fares irked Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee who

immediately asked the PM to remove Dinesh Trivedi

as the Railway Minister. The Union budget was aimed

at increasing the revenue through service tax hike.

Sachin Tendulkar achieved the much awaited

milestone of 100 international centuries after he

scores a century against Bangladesh in the Asia Cup.

Happy Reading !

(Rakesh Dubudu)

Index:

Page 2: National

Page 3: International

Page 4: Spotlight

The Scoop Of The Month

I was offered a bribe of Rs. 14 crore, says

Army Chief

The Army Chief, General V.K. Singh, has alleged

hat an equipment lobbyist offered him a bribe of

Rs. 14 crore, which he reported to Union Defence

Minister A.K. Antony.

n a recent interview , General Singh spoke on a

variety of issues, including the controversy on his

Date of Birth and the shocking state of affairs in

he Army which had allowed the Chief to be

offered a bribe.

The General said the lobbyist offered him the

bribe in order to have a tranche of 600 sub-

tandard vehicles of a particular make cleared for

purchase. He said the vehicles, 7000 of which

were already in use in the Army, had been soldover the years at exorbitant prices with no

questions asked. He said there was no proper

acility where they could be serviced and

maintained and yet they continued to be sold to

he Army: “Just imagine, one of these men had the

gumption to walk up to me and tell me that if I

cleared the tranche, he would give me Rs. 14

crore. He was offering a bribe to me, to the Army

Chief. He told me that people had taken money

before me and they will take money after me.”(contd ….)



pril 10th 2012

National:

The Army chief said the brazenness of the act shocked

him out of his wits. “ I was shocked. If somebody

comes and tells you, you will get so much, what can

you do?” He said the man had recently retired from

he Army, indicating how deeply entrenched the

problem was.The General said he went straight to Mr. Antony and

eported the matter. “I told him, if you think I'm a

misfit, I will walk out.”

Asked what had brought the Army to the state where

he Chief could be offered a bribe, he said: “Obviously

omewhere our standards of probity and integrity

have fallen.” According to General Singh, it was

because he had cracked down on corruption that he

was targeted on his date of birth: “But things are fast

unraveling and you will soon see the hand behind the

drama. You will soon see who the sutradhar of the

play is.”

Pratibha's foreign trips cost nation a record Rs. 205

crore

President Pratibha Patil's foreign visits have cost the

public exchequer Rs. 205 crore, surpassing the record

of all her predecessors. Since assuming office as the

country's first woman President in July 2007, Ms. Patil

has undertaken 12 trips covering 22 countries across

our continents. She has four more months to go in her

ive-year tenure and a trip to South Africa is said to be

on the anvil.

A series of RTI applications has revealed that Air India

ncurred over Rs. 169 crore on use of chartered

aircraft, always a Boeing 747-400, on the foreign visits

by Ms. Patil, mostly accompanied by family members.

A visit to Bhutan was covered by a smaller jet.

A further sum of nearly Rs. 36 crore has been incurred

by the External Affairs Ministry on accommodation,ocal travel, daily allowance and “miscellaneous”

expenses, according to its information.

The RTI applications were filed over three years during

which the authorities concerned showed great

eluctance to reveal information.

The Defence Ministry, which pays Air India for use of

chartered aircraft by the President, fended off RTI

queries and provided little information. The airline has

billed the Defence Ministry for over Rs. 169 crore for

aircraft used by Ms. Patil. Of this, it has paid nearly Rs.

153 crore.

UGC sets target for higher education enrolment

The University Grants Commission (UGC) has

chalked out several plans to increase gross

enrolment ratio (GER) of students in higher

education from the present 20 per cent to 30 per

cent during the 12th Five-Year Plan (2012-17).

The Commission has prepared a document on

inclusive and quality expansion of highereducation. The country's GER, indicator of access

to higher education is about 20 per cent of the

relevant age (17-23 years) group — low compared

to that in advanced countries, UGC Chairman

(Acting) Ved Prakash told on the sidelines of a

programme at the National Assessment and

Accreditation Council (NAAC).“The GER in India

will be increased to 30 per cent. I am very

optimistic,” he said. It would require an increase

in the student enrolment from the present level of14 million to 22 million in colleges and the

universities. More colleges would be opened in

low 374 GER districts, he said.

Mamata derails Trivedi as budget hikes fares

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and senior

Congress leaders, including Finance Minister

Pranab Mukherjee, Congress president Sonia

Gandhi, and her political secretary Ahmed Patel,

went into a huddle at 7 Race Course Road, afterWest Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee

precipitated a potential political train-wreck:

sources said she had faxed a letter to the Prime

Minister, asking him to sack Railway Minister and

fellow Trinamool party leader Dinesh Trivedi and

withdraw the hike in passenger fares announced

in his first budget earlier.

Railway Budget 2012 - at a glance

The five-day-long Trinamool Congress drama overthe passenger fare hike announced in the railway

budget finally ended with Prime Minister

Manmohan Singh forwarding Dinesh Trivedi's

resignation as Railway Minister to President

Pratibha Patil, and then met West Bengal Chief

Minister Mamata Banerjee, agreeing to her

demand that MoS Shipping Mukul Roy replace Mr.

Trivedi.

http://www.thehindu.com/multimedia/archive/00951/Railway_Budget_2012_951624a.pdf
















pril 10th 2012

Setback to Centre as court rejects review plea in

Vodafone case

n a setback to the Union government, the Supreme

Court rejected its plea for a review of the court's

anuary 20 ruling that the Income Tax Department did

not have the jurisdiction to impose Rs.11,000 crore in

ax on the overseas deal between Vodafone

nternational Holdings and Hutchison Group.

A brief order, passed in the chambers of Chief Justice

S.H. Kapadia, said: “We have carefully gone through

he review petition filed by the Union of India on

February 17. We find no merit … [in it]. The review

petition is, accordingly, dismissed.” Justices K.S.

Radhakrishnan and Swatanter Kumar were the other

udges on the Bench. Under the Supreme Court rules,

eview petitions are normally decided in chambers. In

certain cases, the court may issue notice and hear

hem in open court. The outcome is likely to have abearing on the retrospective amendment to the

ncome Tax Act proposed in the Union budget, as any

uch change is likely to have an impact on Vodafone.

n its petition, the Ministry of Finance, through its

Secretary and the Assistant Director of Income Tax,

argued that the judgment suffered from an error

apparent on the face of the record and failed to

consider its case.

The petition said it was a patent error in the finding

hat the offshore transaction, which gave the

Vodafone holding company a 67 per cent stake in

Hutch-Essar, was “bonafide” and “structured FDI

oreign direct investment)” into India. The case did not

nvolve any money flow into India as evident from the

characterisation of the transaction as an offshore deal

and the incontrovertible fact that no investment or

money came to India.

The government said the FDI policy was in no way

under challenge or scrutiny in the case and could not

have been, given that the FDI and interpretation of

axing statutes operated in different realms. The

capital gains tax was imposed on account of

elinquishment of an asset, and this was done through

a specific amendment to the law traceable to the

Bombay High Court's decision.

The government pointed out that the court relied on

he Direct Tax Code Bills of 2009 and 2010 while

allowing the appeals in favour of Vodafone, and

asserted that there was no judicial precedent for

elying on pending legislation while interpreting theexisting legislation.

Reserve Bank warns Muthoot Fincorp

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI), directed Muthoot

Fincorp to stop allowing the use of its

premises/branches or officials, in any manner by

its partnership firm Muthoot Estate Investments

for accepting deposits from public. Muthoot

Fincorp, Kerala, is a registered non-deposit taking

non-banking finance company. “It has come to the

notice of the RBI that a partnership firm with the

name of Muthoot Estate Investments in which the

promoters of Muthoot Fincorp are partners has

collected and has been collecting deposits in the

form of fixed deposits, cumulative deposits and

special public deposits from the public,” RBI said in

a release. These deposits are collected through the

branches of Muthoot Fincorp located at differentplaces in Kerala. “In terms of Section 45-S of the

RBI Act, acceptance of deposits from the public by

Muthoot Estate Investments, which is a

partnership firm, is prohibited,” the RBI added.

EPF interest rate down to 8.25%

The Finance Ministry has given its go-ahead to the

Labour Ministry to fix the rate of interest to be

paid to the EPF subscribers at 8.25 per cent for2011-12 instead of 9.5 per cent paid in 2010-11.

Taxi, second-class rail travel out of service tax net

Metered taxis, entry to amusement facilities,

second-class rail travel, and betting, gambling and

lottery will not attract the 12 per cent service tax,

as per the budget proposal. The negative list of

services, on which the increased service tax of 12

per cent will not be levied, includes admission to

entertainment events, access to amusementfacilities and travel by radio taxis and auto

rickshaws. Other important services, which will not

attract the tax, include funeral, burial, mutate

services and transport of deceased. The service

tax, according to the budget proposals of Finance

Minister Pranab Mukherjee, will be levied on all

services which are not mentioned in the negative

list. In order to net about Rs.1.24 lakh crore from

the service tax during 2012-13, the Minister has

proposed to increase the rate of levy from 10 per

cent to 12 per cent.

Business



pril 10th 2012

Spotlight: Jindal Global Law School, Haryana

Jindal Global Law School (JGLS), India’s first global law school is situated on a

60-acre state of the art residential JGU campus. The vision of JGU is to

promote global courses, global programmes, global curriculum, global

research, global collaborations, and global interaction through a global faculty.

In the academic year 2012-13, JGLS offers a five year B.A. LL.B. (Hons.)

programme; a three year LL.B. programme and an LL.M. programme. The

LL.M. programme of JGLS is offered for law graduates, corporate lawyers, legal

practitioners, civil servants, diplomats and judges with three options

for specialisation.

el free to write to: [email protected] We don’t wish to print this journal, save paper, avoid printing

This month in pictures:

achin Tendulkar scored his

00th century in International

ricket against Bangladesh

Soumitra Chatterjee is selected for

the Dada Saheb Phalke Award

A.S. Kiran Kumar is the new

Director of Space Applications

Centre (SAC), Ahmedabad

Boxer Vijender Singh qualified

for the London Olympics

ijay Bahuguna is the new CM of

ttarakhand

Mukul Roy is the new Railway

minister

Students for admission to the five year B.A. LL.B. (Hons.), three year LL.B. and two year LL.M. programmes at

JGLS will be selected on on the basis of their performance in the Law School Admission Test —India (LSAT—

India). LSAT—India is an entrance test designed by the Law School Admission Council (LSAC), USA and is

conducted by Pearson VUE, LSAC’s affiliate in India. The test will be in a multiple choice format and covers

logical reasoning, analytical reasoning and reading comprehension. A sample test is available on the LSAT—

India website - www.pearsonvueindia.com/lsatindia.

Various scholarships such as O.P. Jindal Outstanding Merit ,Naveen Jindal Young Global Scholarships, Shallu

Jindal Outstanding Women Scholarships are available for prospective students.

http://www.pearsonvueindia.com/lsatindia






abhyaas law bulletin - april 2012

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