Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on March 24 announced a number of measures for the extension of statutory and regulatory compliances during the coronavirus outbreak in India. We have listed some of the important provisions.
Financial services
The debit card holders can withdraw cash from any bank ATM without any charges for the next three months to avoid congestion at ATMs. The State Bank of India has waived the requirement of holding a minimum balance in savings account and there will be no charges on not keeping the minimum balance requirement. The FM has also reduced digital charges for trade transactions.
Taxes
For the 2018-19 fiscal, the last date for returns and for delayed payments has been extended to June 30, 2020. The interest rate has been reduced to 9% from 12%. For delayed deposit of TDS, interest has been reduced to 9% from 18%. Aadhaar and Pan linking date has been extended from March 31 to June 30. All compliances under Income Tax Act, Wealth Tax Act, Benami Transaction Act and Black Money Act have been extended to June 30, 2020. The ‘Vivaad se Vishwaas’ scheme has been extended to June 30 and the additional 10% charges have been waived.
GST
All GST returns for March, April, May and composition returns have been extended to June 30, 2020. It has been declared that no late fee and penalty will be charged from companies worth less than `5 crore.
Customs
The last date which was March 3 for the ‘Sabka Vishwaas’ scheme has been extended to June 30. It has also been declared that customs clearance will work 24x7 till June 30.
Companies
It was announced that a moratorium has been issued from April 1 till September 30 in respect of the MCA-21 registry. The mandatory requirement for holding board meetings has been relaxed for a period of 60 days, applicable for the next two quarters. For newly incorporated companies, an additional time of six more months will be given for filing declaration of commencement of business. It was also declared that if a company director does not comply with minimum residency requirement of 182 days, it shall not be treated as a violation now.
Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC)
The threshold of default has been raised to `1crore from `1 lakh to prevent triggering of insolvency proceedings for SMEs. It has also been declared that if the situation continues beyond April, then sections 7, 9, and 10 of the IBC will be suspended for a period of six months.
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