FICCI team meets Jaitley, makes pre-budget suggestions

The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) has stressed on the new Finance Minister Arun Jaitley the need for a conducive tax regulatory environment, the industry chamber said Sunday.

"To support the forward looking development and delivery oriented agenda of the new government, a non-adversarial, conducive and fair tax regulatory environment is the need of the hour," a statement here said after a FICCI delegation called on Jaitley with a pre-budget wish-list.

"The government could ideally declare as policy that retrospective action shall not be resorted to, save in rarest of cases, but never for creating a fresh onus or liability for a previous period. In fairness, retrospective change if needed must invariably favour the taxpayer," FICCI president Sidharth Birla said.

"We must show that India values and welcomes capital, and supports it by clear and credible policies," he added.

Citing concerns related to taxation of capital, Birla said: "Provisions which effectively deem portions of capital to be in the nature of income are serious deterrents to genuine transactions, while keeping the door open for aberrant behaviour."

The industry lobby also suggested that changes can be examined in laws, to aggressively widen tax base, simplify laws and rationalise exemptions.

To promote entrepreneurship, FICCI suggested introducing "start-up rebated tax (START)" in line with other Asian nations.

The suggestions also included taking possible steps on illegal assets abroad through the tax net.