India To Open Eight Overseas Tax Units

by Mary Swire, Tax-News.com, Hong Kong

18 March 2011

The Indian Minister of State for Finance (Revenue) Shri S S Palanimanickam has announced that the Government has made plans to launch eight new Income Tax Overseas Units (ITOUs) in France, Germany, Netherlands, Cyprus, USA, UK, UAE and Japan in the next financial year.

The offices will be used for the exchange of information, speeding up of the resolution of tax disputes and also to assist in transfer-pricing cases.

Two ITOUs are already in operation in Singapore and Mauritius, although they are not engaged in the tax collection process directly.

Talking about the country’s plans for the ITOUs at the end of last year Sunil Mitra, Revenue Secretary, had said that there was a definite trend towards the Indian private sector moving away from developed country bank deposits to using offshore financial centres. He said that the share of Indian offshore deposits increased from 36.4% of total deposits in 1995 to 54.2% in 2009.

Mr Mitra also emphasized that the provisions of future Advance Pricing Agreements as proposed in the Direct Taxes Code would ensure proper bench-marking and stability in the transfer pricing regime.

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