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Delhi government's anti-corruption branch (ACB) has arrested seven individuals, including a suspended GST officer, three advocates, two transporters, and a proprietor of fake firms, for their alleged involvement in a GST fraud racket. The fraud involved fraudulent GST refunds that amounted to approximately Rs 54 crore, and forged invoices totaling Rs 718 crore were discovered. The operation uncovered nearly 500 non-existent firms, which appeared to be engaging in business activities solely on paper to claim the fraudulent refunds, a TOI report stated. Officials have pointed to significant procedural lapses and malpractices by the arrested GST officer, Babita Sharma, who has since been suspended. The fraudulent refunds were reportedly approved without proper verification of input tax credit, which has resulted in a substantial loss to the government’s exchequer. ACB Chief Joint Commissioner Madhur Verma highlighted the nature of the fraud:

market indices, like Nifty and Sensex, are vital tools for investors, serving as benchmarks for measuring investment performance, gauging market sentiment, and tracking trends They simplify our understanding of market direction and economic conditions. They also enable the creation of diversified products like index funds and ETFs, offering broad market exposure. Stocks included in the indices are selected based on market capitalisation, liquidity, and financial stability.

What had been touted as Wall Street’s big rotation into smaller firms sputtered just as quickly as it started. 

India's July retail inflation slowed to 3.54%, its lowest in nearly five years, on the back of a sharp decline in food inflation, data released Monday showed. Economists struck a note of caution, pointing out that the drop was largely due to the base effect of high inflation last year and that it could head back up in the coming months. Retail inflation based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI) in July 2023 was 7.44% while that in June this year printed at 5.08%. Food inflation eased to a 13-month low of 5.42% in July from 9.36% in June, taking overall inflation below RBI target rate of 4% for the first time since September 2019.

It’s getting harder for young Canadians to find a job. A post-pandemic influx of cheap foreign workers in restaurants and retail stores may be making it tougher.

Olympian Abhinav Bindra-run Abhinav Bindra Foundation, registered in Mohali, for five years. The registration will allow the organisation to receive foreign grants, officials said. Bindra won India's first individual gold medal at the Olympics — in the men's 10-metre air rifle competition — at Beijing in 2008. The non-profit organisation run by Bindra is dedicated to ensuring that global best practices are made available to all sporting activities, according to its website. During the recent Paris Olympics, India secured 71st rank with Neeraj Chopra, Manu Bhaker, Sarabjot Singh, Swapnil Kusale, Aman Sehrawat and the Indian hockey team winning medals.

Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY) Urban 2.0 plan over the next five years is expected to boost the affordable housing segment, allowing those migrating to cities for a livelihood to secure reasonable accommodation. PMAY-U is among the major flagship programmes being implemented by the government to provide all-weather pucca houses to all eligible beneficiaries in the urban areas. Under PMAY-U, more than 11.8 million homes have been sanctioned while nearly 9 million houses have already been constructed and delivered to the beneficiaries. “The nature of the housing scheme has changed in its new avatar. Government is using a wider mix of schemes ranging from interest subsidy to credit guarantee. While the quantum of interest subsidy per beneficiary has been scaled down, the government’s capital support will help a larger base of needy population. The government intends to do both — enhance its capital productivity and accelerate the ‘Housing for All’ timelines,” said Vivek Rathi, National Director Research, Knight Frank India.

Rajya Sabha seats. Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma confirmed that the party will field his wife, Mehtab Chandee for the upcoming Gambegre bypoll. These seats fell vacant following the election of Union minister Sarbananda Sonowal from Dibrugarh Lok Sabha seat in the recently held election. Rajya Sabha MP Kamakhya Tassa has relinquished his seat after he was elected from Kaziranga seat in the parliamentary polls. There will be by polls in five Assembly seats. BJP is likely to contest three seats and leave one each for its allies Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) and United People's Party Liberal (UPPL).

RBI) has prohibited housing finance companies (HFC) from raising public deposits for more than five years, placed a ceiling on the quantum of deposits they can raise, and asked them to increase the share of liquid assets to 15% from 13% now in a phased manner. RBI on Monday said that public deposits accepting HFC can renew deposits after 12 months or more but not later than sixty months. It has allowed existing deposits with maturities above sixty months shall be repaid as per their existing repayment profile. Separately, RBI has directed non-bank finance companies to put in place a mechanism to provide nomination facility for depositors irrespective of customers demanding the service.

The market volatility we’ve seen over the past week and a half has been astounding. The VXX, an exchange-traded fund that tracks the VIX volatility index, rocketed higher as investors sold equity positions across the board, with more speculative assets such as U.S. tech and cryptocurrencies getting hit the hardest.

Ministry of Education announced the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) 2024 on Monday. The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras ranked first in the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) 2024, becoming the top ranked institution for the sixth consecutive year. Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru has been ranked as the best university. IIT-Madras is also the best-ranked engineering college in the country for the last nine years.

British Columbia offers diverse pathways for immigration, each tailored to different types of applicants, including skilled workers, healthcare professionals, international graduates, and entrepreneurs. Here’s a deeper dive into each immigration stream and its specific requirements:

The family of a French explorer who died in a submersible implosion has filed a more than $50 million lawsuit, saying the crew experienced “terror and mental anguish” before the disaster and accusing the sub’s operator of gross negligence.Paul-Henri Nargeolet was among five people who died when the Titan submersible imploded during a voyage to the famed Titanic wreck site in the North Atlantic in June 2023. No one survived the trip aboard the experimental submersible owned by OceanGate, a company in Washington state that has since suspended operations.Known as “Mr.

according to the Canadian Airports Council. The next 30 are at barely 70 per cent.Driving the travel rebound is a surge along big-city routes.

₹10,461 crore, the price-to-earnings multiple works out to 20x for FY25, while the same for peers is over 80x plus. To be sure, the price-to-earnings multiple is not the most preferred valuation metric for life insurance companies. That’s because the expenses in the life insurance business are recognized upfront, depressing the profits in the initial years.

tax on stocks and mutual funds stays. It has been seven years since this tax was introduced and the only change has been the rate increase from 10% to 12.5% this year. This is now the uniform rate not just for stocks and equity funds, but for many other types of investments. However, this is where the similarity ends. For investors who want to earn long-term returns and build real wealth through equity-based assets, the tax structure means that significant attention needs to be paid to where they invest and when they buy and sell those investments. The single most important point to be noted is that it’s far more beneficial, from a tax point of view, to invest in mutual funds than stocks. While this has been true since February 2018, the hike in long-term capital gains tax in this year’s Budget has made it that much more important. In any case, even earlier, many investors did not appreciate this about taxation. I’ll recap the underlying principle. All equity portfolios need some buying or selling as individual stocks become more or less desirable. This is true even if you are good at choosing stocks and holding most of these for several years. Time goes by, circumstances change, companies and markets evolve, and the formerly good stocks have to be sold and something better bought. If you are investing in stocks yourself, these transactions will translate into tax liability.

While Joshi started early, the vehicle he chose to reach his destination was not quite appropriate. He bought a traditional life insurance policy to save for his son’s education. For an annual premium of Rs.80,000, the policy covers him for Rs. 8 lakh and will start annual payouts when Swaraj turns 16. The returns work out to less than 6%. “Traditional insurance policies are not the best investment. They usually offer very low returns,” says Rohit Shah, Founder and CEO of GYR Financial Planners. Choosing the wrong investment is a common problem. It becomes even more acute while saving for critical long-term financial goals such as children’s education and weddings. Going for the wrong investment option could leave you with a shortfall in the target amount and jeopardise your planning. A study by financial planning firm, Finsafe India, shows that one out of three investors do not know where to invest. “This indicates a strong need for better financial education and investment guidance,” says Mrin Agarwal, Founder and CEO, Finsafe India.

shipbuilding policy that includes introducing a recycling credit note scheme, a fixed rate of subsidy for 10 years and the establishment of three maritime clusters in Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat and Odisha, officials said. This is part of the Centre's push to grab a larger share of the global shipbuilding market, they added. It's proposed that a credit note equivalent to 40% of the scrap value of a ship being dismantled in an Indian breaking yard would be given to fleet owners, both Indian and global. This can be reimbursed against the cost of construction of a new vessel at an Indian yard, officials said. «With this scheme, fleet owners will be encouraged to recycle ships in India,» one of them said. «The only condition is that they will have to build new ships in India to get the benefit of the scheme. If they go outside India to order new ships, the credit note will not be applicable. The idea is to promote Indian yards in the global market and help them get more orders.»

Allied Blenders & Distillers (ABD), which owns the Officer's Choice whisky brand, is in talks with vodka giant Russian Standard and Bangkok-based Thai Beverage (ThaiBev) to market and distribute their products in India, two executives privy to the development said. The talks, if fructify, will help ABD to widen its product portfolio from largely whisky to a host of spirit segments such as vodka and scotch, while the two global companies will get an entry into the world's biggest alcohol consuming country with a strong partner which has robust distribution and manufacturing capabilities, the executives said. ThaiBev's global portfolio through its arm International Beverage includes scotch brands Old Pulteney, Speyburn, Balblair, Reid vodka, Phraya rum and Source gin. The company is owned by Thai-Chinese billionaire businessman Charoen Sirivadhanabhakdi and is listed on the Singapore Stock Exchange. Russian Standard is the largest vodka brand, owned by billionaire Roustam Tariko.

independent directors at India’s top blue-chip companies has more than doubled in five years, reflecting their increased responsibility, time commitment and effort. The median compensation for independent directors at Nifty-50 companies shot up 106% to Rs 87.4 lakh in FY24 from Rs 42.3 lakh in FY19, with a 25% pay jump in the last fiscal alone, showed an analysis of these companies shared with ET by specialised executive compensation advisory firm Exec-Rem Advisors. Experts said the pay is being driven up by companies wanting to ensure they get adequate time and attention from independent directors as their roles become increasingly complex and demanding, requiring them to navigate unforeseen challenges and crises, provide oversight on critical issues, deal with stricter regulatory requirements, ensure continuity, and influence inclusivity and innovation.

landslides, traffic chaosand house collapses, as well as a dam breach which inundated several villages in Haryana. The Jammu and Kashmir administration said the annual Amarnath Yatra has been suspended after heavy rains in the Shri Amarnathji Yatra area. This was the second straight day of heavy rains in the region with Rajasthan being the worst hit as the state reported 16 deaths over two days — two on Saturday and 14 on Sunday. Its Karauli district recorded «exceptionally heavy rainfall» of 38 cm. Nine people, including eight members of a family, died in Punjab's Hoshiarpur on Sunday as their vehicle was swept away by a overflowing seasonal rivulet.