Equalisation levy a ‘sovereign proper; not a unilateral measure: FM

Justifying the two per cent equalisation levy (EL) imposed by India on the provision of providers by multinational enterprises, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday mentioned it’s a sovereign proper to tax revenues earned from operations within the nation.

“Equalisation levy is not a unilateral measure… we are not an exception as many countries have done so,” Sitharaman mentioned in a post-Budget convention in Bengaluru.

Companies like Netflix and Facebook get their shoppers in a big nation like India. “It’s important for the industry to stand up and tell their international sellers that India deserves to tax this,” she mentioned. In October 2021, G20 international locations permitted a worldwide deal to undertake a 15 per cent minimal company tax and reallocate taxing rights for big worthwhile multinational enterprises (MNEs) to international locations the place they promote services and products.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday pulled up tax boards for allegedly not responding to grievances of the tax assessees and directed their officers to order Saturdays to carry conferences with them, as per a PTI report.

(FE, with PTI inputs)