BUDGET: Industry wishlist

Extend Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) scheme beyond March 2009

Exempt foreign firms with BPO operations in India from tax on income (limit it to foreign parent, if must)

That telecom operators importing telecom software should be exempt from the 8% of counter-vailing duty (CVD) since telecom software is equipment-specific and therefore cannot be treated as 'Canned Software'.

That the limit on utilisation of credit only to the extent of 20% of the amount of service tax payable on taxable output service be removed for telecom sector

That MAT does not continue to be applicable to telecom service providers, since it nullifies the benefit of having section 80 IA which provides tax exemption to the infrastructure sector.

That TDS and service tax should not be applicable on interconnect usage charges paid by companies and necessary clarification should be issued in this matter.

That services provided to in-roamers should not be liable for service tax

To provide further subsidy to high-tech industry

To abolish sales tax on all IT products

To reform duty structure to encourage domestic hardware manufacturing