|
The Goods & Services Tax (GST) was passed by the Indian Parliament in the month of August, 2016 which would subsume various central (Excise Duty, Additional Excise Duty, service tax, Countervailing or Additional Customs Duty, Special Additional Duty of Customs, etc.), as well as state-level indirect taxes (VAT/sales tax, purchase tax, entertainment tax, luxury tax, entry tax, etc) leading to only one national-level central GST and a state-level GST spanning the entire value chain for all goods and services, with some exemptions.
The first meeting of Goods & Services Tax (GST) Council concluded on 23rd September 2016 has decided to exempt businesses with annual turnover below Rs. 20 lakh out of the GST net. The meeting was presided by Union Finance Minister in New Delhi and was attended by Finance ministers of states.
Read more
In 2010, when WhatsApp was launched, it had declared a privacy policy of total/complete safety against any kind of sharing of data/details of users but recently changed its position to allow WhatsApp to share account information of users with Facebook and its group companies to improve advertisements and products experiences on Facebook. The users were asked to agree to the terms and privacy policy by 25th September 2016 to continue using WhatsApp. Two students, Karmanya Singh Sareen and Shreya Sethi filed public interest litigation before the Delhi High Court challenging WhatsApp’s privacy policy.
A Delhi High Court Bench on 23rd September 2016 has allowed WhatsApp to go ahead with the new privacy policy and to share data with Facebook under it’s new privacy policy. Additionally, the Court directed Telecom Regulatory Authority of India to look into the issue if messaging services like WhatsApp can be brought under existing laws. But the Bench has directed that, if the users opt for completely deleting “WhatsApp” account before 25th September 2016, the information/data/details of such users should be deleted completely from “WhatsApp” servers and the same shall not be shared with the “Facebook” or any one of its group companies. As far as the users who opt to remain in WhatsApp are concerned, the existing information/data/details of such users up to 25th September 2016 shall not be shared with Facebook or any one of its group companies.
Read more
|