Cabinet approves DTC bill raising exemption limit to Rs 2 lakhs

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The Cabinet on Thursday approved Direct Taxes Code (DTC) Bill, clearing decks for tabling the legislation in the Monsoon Session of Parliament so that the new Act ushering in reduced tax rates and exemptions may come into effect from next fiscal.

The Cabinet cleared the bill, highly placed sources said. When enacted, DTC will replace the archaic Income Tax Act and simplify the whole direct tax regime in the country.

The code aims at reducing tax rates, but expanding the tax base by minimisingexemptions.

The Finance Ministry had earlier come out with a draft on the DTC bill, some of whose provisions drew strong criticism from industry as well as the public.

To address those issues, the ministry brought out the revised draft, dropping earlier proposals of taxing provident funds on withdrawal and levying Minimum Alternate Tax on corporates based on their assets.

“As of now, it is proposed to provide the EEE (Exempt- Exempt-Exempt) method of taxation for Government Provident Fund (GPF), Public Provident Fund (PPF) and Recognised Provident Funds (RPF)”, the revised DTC released by theFinance Ministry said.

The revised draft also puts pensions administered by the interim regulator PFRDA, including pension of government employees who were recruited since January 2004, under EEE treatment.

The first DTC draft had proposed to tax all savings schemes including provident funds at the time of withdrawal bringing them under the EET (Exempt-Exempt-Tax) mode.

Under the EEE mode, the tax exemption is enjoyed at all the three stages–investment, accumulation and withdrawal.

As regards MAT, it has been clarified that tax would be levied on the book profit, as is the current practice, and not on gross assets has proposed in the draft. The government, Mitra said, had received 1,600 representations on the first draft which was made public in August last year.

The second draft, however, did not give any details on the income tax structure such as the slabs or rates, which were provided in the first draft released in August 2009.

The first draft had suggested 10 per cent tax on income from Rs 1.60-10 lakhs and 20 per cent on income between Rs 10-25 lakhs and 30 per cent beyond that. However, officials later said these slabs were illustrative.

It is also proposed to raise the income tax exemption limit from the present Rs 1.6 lakh to Rs 2 lakh, a move that could leave more money in the hands of tax payers. The officials said the tax rates would be made known only in the proposed Act.

The earlier DTC draft had proposed to reduce the corporate tax to 25 per cent from the present 30 per cent. The revised proposal has also made it clear that tax incentives on housing loans will continue. Payment on interest on housing loans up to Rs 1.5 lakh will continue. The earlier draft was silent on housing loans.