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Bilateral Current Affairs
May 3rd Week 2015 Current Affairs
Category : Bilateral Current Affairs
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1) Honorary doctorate to President Pranab 

President Pranab Mukherjee was conferred honorary degree by the Russian Diplomatic Academy in Moscow. The President is on four days tour of Russia to witness the Victory Day parade in Moscow to mark the 70th anniversary of allied forces victory during the Second World War.

2) India, Japan to set up Logistics Data Bank to expedite bilateral trade

In a first of its kind with any country, India and Japan are going to soon set up a Logistics Data Bank (LDB) service that will ensure speedy movement of two-way merchandise trade by way of real-time tracking of container and cargo movement in the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC) region.
 
  • The LDB will be operated by a special purpose vehicle (SPV), which will be jointly run by DMIC Trust from Indian side and Japan`s NEC. Once in operation, the LDB is expected to save $3.2 billion annually by 2017 on the basis of real time tracking of container movement. The Shareholders Agreement (SHA) for the project is under discussion presently. The concept was basically developed to address the issue of tracking and viewing container movement across all ports to the ICDs and end-users. 
  • In terms of revenue earning for the government, the data will be collected from all stakeholders for a fee with user charges collected from shippers based on mandatory user charge, which will be 0.2 per cent of the total transportation cost, Kumar said. Presently, almost 60 per cent of the container traffic is concentrated in the western corridor. Besides, several stakeholders such as the railways, ports, customs and transporters operate their own IT-enabled systems without sharing the data with each other.
 

3) DTAA with South Korea

The Union Cabinet on 6 May 2015 gave its approval for the revised Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement (DTAA) with South Korea. The bilateral DTAA was signed in 1985 for the avoidance of double taxation and for the prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income for the citizens of both the countries.
 
  • Its primary purpose is to provide for tax stability to the residents of India and South Korea and facilitate mutual economic cooperation as well as stimulate the flow of investment, technology and services between the two countries. It provides for source based taxation of capital gains, making adjustments to profits of associated enterprises on the basis of arm`s length principle and residence based taxation of shipping income. 
  • It rationalizes tax rates in the Articles on Dividends, Interest and Royalties and Fees for Technical Services. It enables effective exchange of information and assistance in collection of taxes between tax authorities It incorporates limitation of benefits provisions under the agreement to ensure that the benefits are availed of only by genuine residents of both countries.
  • www.sakshieducation.com Published on 5/12/2015 5:07:00 PM