-The Hindu Business Line No special treatment for political parties, clarifies Jaitley New Delhi: Political parties registered with the election commission may not necessarily escape scrutiny of their returns with regard to deposits of old demonetised notes just because they are exempted from taxation under Section 13 A of income tax law. For political parties to gain exemption under Section 13 A, certain conditions have to be met. Also, there are "enough provisions" in...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The Supreme Court has decided to examine the constitutional question of whether a political party or a political leader can file a PIL before it. A bench of Justices Dipak Misra and Amitav Roy decided to examine the maintainability of such PILs after attorney-general Mukul Rohatgi said that two PILs filed by an NGO-turned-political outfit, Swaraj Abhiyan, and a Chhattisgarh leader cannot be entertained because of the "political...

-The Hindu Centre for Politics and Public Policy Prime Minister Narendra Modi's announcement demonetising high denomination notes on November 8, 2016, will do little to address the prime objective of flushing out black money but will adversely affect the economy in the short term, especially the informal sector, which is predominant in India, says M. Govinda Rao, a Member of the Fourteenth Finance Commission and Emeritus Professor, National Institute of Public...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The Centre today told the Supreme Court that political parties that received donation from Indian subsidiaries of foreign companies could not be said to have flouted the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act as Parliament had amended the relevant provision in 2010. Neither the BJP nor the Congress had, therefore, violated the FCRA in receiving donations from the Vedanta Group's Indian subsidiaries between 2007 and 2009, the Centre contended. Hence,...

-NDTV   New Delhi: The Election Commission has raised concern over the use of indelible ink in banks after the notes ban, saying the move should not affect the "election process in any manner". Five states will hold by-elections on Saturday. In a letter to the Finance Ministry, the Commission has said that several states will hold elections and there will be confusion as indelible ink also marks citizens who have already...