stammering

The architect of New South Wales’ Champions League Twenty20 triumph, Brett Lee says he always strives to rise to the big occasions and it was immensely satisfying to shine in Friday night’s final against Trinidad & Tobago.

NSW were in tatters before Lee’s 31-ball 48 powered them to a competitive 159 for nine. The tearaway pacer returned to claim two early wickets to unhinge T&T.

Lee, who bagged both the Man of the Match and Man of the Series awards, said he is a big-match player and happy to have made his mark in the all-important summit clash.

“I think my game is coming up well and I’m enjoying it. I live for special moments like this and want to do well in big moments. When the crowd gets behind me, it becomes special and I’m happy I did well tonight,” said the pacer

Indian soldiers take great pride in the crease of their trousers, the twirl of their moustache and the shine on the metal and leather they wear.

Arms, medals, epaulettes are all brought to the perfect shine before a parade. One key item of inspection is the glint on the ammunition boots.

One enterprising regiment, the story goes, instead of using polish bought a box of Asian Paints paint and used it to good effect on the boots. Asian Paints managing director & CEO PM Murty doesn’t know if it’s a true story, though he joined the company way back in 1971. What he does know is that such small purchases can make the distinction between profit and loss, survival and extinction.

Asian Paints has for long sold very small cans of paint which are used to colour the horns of bulls during the Pola festival in Maharashtra and the auspicious small red and yellow stripes at the bottom of the front door of Tamil Nadu homes.

This might not always be remunerative, but it has given a tremendous boost to the company’s brand recall. When the market is up, everybody makes money. But when the chips are down, only resilient brands stay afloat.

Serena Williams was fined $10,000 Sunday for a profanity-laced tirade directed at a U.S. Open line judge, and an investigation is under way to determine whether there should be additional punishment.

The $10,000 penalty — not quite 3 percent of the $350,000 in prize money Williams earned by reaching the semifinals at Flushing Meadows — is the maximum on-site fine that can be issued for unsportsmanlike conduct at a Grand Slam tournament.

The U.S. Open said in a statement that the Grand Slam Committee Administrator will “determine if the behavior of Ms. Williams warrants consideration as a major offense for which additional penalties can be imposed.”

Williams, who was the defending champion, also was docked $500 for smashing her racket after the first set of what became a 6-4, 7-5 loss to Kim Clijsters on Saturday night.

The growth of six core infrastructure industries eased to 1.8 per cent in July, the lowest this fiscal, as petroleum refinery acted as a drag on the sector.

A 14.4 per cent contraction in petroleum refinery products constricted expansion of the six key industries in July, against 5.1 per cent a year ago.

The core sector, which comprises petroleum refinery, crude oil, coal, electricity, cement and finished steel and accounts for 26.68 per cent in the country’s industrial production, had grown by 6.8 per cent in June and had then raised hopes of industrial recovery.

Crude oil, though at lower rates, dipped by 0.4 per cent in July against minus three per cent a year ago. However, coal expanded by 9.7 per cent against 5.5 per cent, electricity by 3.3 per cent as compared to 4.5 per cent, cement by 10.6 per cent as against 5.5 per cent and finished steel by 1.2 per cent as against 6 per cent.

However, thanks to better showing in the previous three months, core industries improved performance by 4.1 per cent for April-July period, against the corresponding months in the last fis

Income tax incentives on education loans expanded to cover vocational studies after schooling.

The All India Kisan Sabha has welcomed Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for admitting that the food grain production has been affected by a below average monsoon.

In a statement the Sabha says that paddy cultivation has been severly affected and that the PM had not announced any hike in the Minimum Support Price for the growers, as sought by them. The Sabha also calls for the reccomendations of the MS Swaminathan Foundation on calculating MSP be implemented.

The Kisan sabha welcomed the Centre’s move to reimburse 50 percent of diesel cost incurred by states. The National Food Safety Mission and the Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana ( National Agriculture Development Scheme) were also targetted for not meeting their targets and failing to increase food production in the country. The lack of transfer of technology and information , especially by the Ministry of Agriculture has come in for a lot of flak.

The Supreme Court has held that if a man and a woman are residing together for a long time and have been accepted by the society as husband and wife, a presumption of a valid marriage can be drawn.

“A long cohabitation and acceptance of society of a man and woman as husband and wife goes a long way in establishing
a valid marriage,” a Bench of Justices S B Sinha and Cyriac Joseph observed.

The Bench said when disputes of valid marriages comes into question, courts can rely not only on the various material placed before it, but also draw a presumption on the basis of the conduct between the two parties. “In arriving at a finding of fact, indisputably the learned trial judge was not only entitled to analyse the evidences brought on record by the parties so as to come to a conclusion as to whether all the ingredients of a valid marriage as contained in Section 5 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 stand established or not.

“A presumption of a valid marriage having regard to the fact that they had been residing together for a long time and has been accepted in society as husband and wife, could also be drawn,” the apex court said.

The Bench passed the ruling while dismissing an appeal of one Challamma, who questioned the claim of a woman’s marriage to her deceased son K Subramanya.

Prior to his marriage, Subramanya had nominated his mother Challamma as nominee in his insurance policies. After his death, Challamma sought the entire survival benefit accruing from the insurance policies to herself. She claimed that the other claimant, Tilaga, was not married to his son as there was no valid proof of the same. But the trial court awarded Challama only one-fourth of the amount and the remaining went to Tilaga, whose marriage with Subramanya was accepted by the judge on the basis of the material evidence produced before it.

Challama appealed to the Karnataka High Court but it dismissed her plea. She later approached the apex court. Rejecting her plea, the apex court said the question as to whether a valid marriage had taken place between deceased Subramanya and Tilaga is essentially a question of fact. In the present case, the wife had proved with material facts that she had married Subramanya and lived with him for over three years, the apex court said. Whereas, Challama could not adduce sufficient evidence to prove her charges, it noted. “A heavy burden, thus, lies on the person who seeks to prove that no marriage has taken place,” the Bench said. Further, the apex court said a nominee could not be treated as being equivalent to an heir or legatee. “The amount of interest under the policy could, therefore, be claimed by the heirs of the assured in accordance with the law of succession governing them,” the Bench added while dismissing the mother-in-law’s appeal.

Prudent fiscal and monetary policies have helped India in dodging the recession and sustaining the economy, the research arm of the rating agency Moody’s said.

Calling India a ’sprinter’, it said the downward trend in the country’s industrial output seemed to have ended, with a pick-up likely due to new infrastructure development.

Investor confidence in India had certainly improved, as reflected in the rapid increase in net capital inflows in the stock market during recent months, Sherman Chan, Moody’s Economy.com economist, said in a note on the recovery of the Asia-Pacific region on Wednesday.

“Amid increased sightings of green shoots, the bottom of the global downturn is now in sight,” she said, adding that “China, India and Indonesia have dodged recession and maintained strong growth despite the global turmoil.”

Key Asia-Pacific economies possess different structural characteristics and have thus embarked on different recovery trajectories. Australia and Korea, she said, would recover fast, Thailand and Singapore would take longer, and Japan will have it tough.

And all these economies are expected to grow in 2010.

Next in the recovery race in Asia Pacific region comes the ‘joggers’. “Australia, Hong Kong, the Philippines and South Korea will recover swiftly from the annual contraction this year.”

Following the ‘joggers’ are the ‘walkers’. “Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and New Zealand will take a little longer to return to pre-crisis GDP levels,” the Sydney-based economist said.

And, in the last comes the ‘crawler’. “Japan looks worst off in the region, with a long and tough recovery path ahead due to a sluggish domestic sector,” she said.

Japan is the weakest link in the Asia-Pacific region with firms reporting excess capacity, including excess workers. Therefore, the outlook for investment and employment is dismal.

“Japan’s GDP will take several years to return to the pre-crisis level. An annual contraction of 6.5 per cent is likely in 2009, followed by an expected rebound of only 0.7 per cent in 2010 and 1.2 per cent in 2011,” she said, adding that the rapidly ageing population have left policymakers almost powerless in stimulating consumption growth.

I own shares of various Indian companies and receive dividends. Is it taxable?
No. The dividend declared by Indian companies is not taxable in the hands of the share holders because tax on distributed profits have already been borne by the company.

I am a religious preacher and earn money from preaching. Do I have to pay tax and file return?

Yes.

Can I claim deduction for my personal and household expenditure in calculating my income or profit?

No.

Most of my income is given away in charity and I am left with just enough to meet my personal requirement. What will be considered as my income?

What is done after the income is earned does not determine its taxation. However charitable contribution to approved institutions will give you the benefit of certain deductions from taxable income.

My daughter stays in USA. She owns a house in India and has let it out. She has asked tenants to pay rent to me so that I can a lead decent life. She has not received any rent. Is she still liable to tax? What if she transfers the house to me?

Your daughter is the owner of the house and therefore she is liable to pay tax even though you receive the rent. If the house is transferred, then you would become the owner and you will have to pay tax on the rental income.

My children living abroad send me Rs.20000/- per month for my maintenance. Would this be considered as my income?

No.

Is there any limit of income below which I need not pay taxes?

At the moment individual, HUF, AOP, and BOI having income below rupees one lakh need not pay any income tax. For other categories [persons] such as co-operatives societies, firms, companies and local authorities no such exempted limits exists, so they have to pay taxes on their entire income. In cases of senior citizens aged above 65 years and women the exempted limit for the financial year 2007-08 are rupees one lakh ninety thousand and one lakh forty thousand respectively.

What does the Income Tax Department consider as income?

The word Income has a very broad and inclusive meaning. In case of a salaried person, all that is received from an employer in cash, kind or as a facility is considered as income. For a businessman, his net profits will constitute income. Income may also flow from investments in the form of Interest, Dividend, and Commission etc. Infect the Income Tax Act does not differentiate between legal and illegal income for purpose of taxation. Under the Act, all incomes earned by persons are classified into 5 different heads, such as:

a. Income from Salary
b. Income from House property
c. Income from Business or Profession
d. Income from capital gains
e. Income from other sources

Are all receipts considered as income?
No.

Receipts can be classified into two kinds. A) Revenue receipt B) Capital receipt.

The general rule under the Income tax Act is that, all revenue receipt are taxable unless a receipt is specifically exempted and all capital receipts are exempt from taxation unless there is a provision to tax it. Gifts and loans etc are in the nature of capital receipts not attracting tax.

What are revenue and capital receipts?

In a simple language, all that one derives from a source is called revenue receipt. For ex. Salary from employment, Rent from property, Interest or Divided from Investments, Profits from business. When an income is earned on account of transacting the source itself, it is called Capital receipt. For ex. Sale of land and building, business, investment etc.

Is income tax levied on gifts received by a person?

Gift exceeding Rs 25,000 is taxable unless it is received from

a. any person who is a relative or
b. on occasion of marriage or
c. under will or by inheritance or in contemplation of death of the payer