The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has relaxed the provisions of TDS/TCS in the event of the death of deductee/collectee, before the linkage of PAN and Aadhaar, according to an official statement issued on Wednesday.

“To redress the grievances of the taxpayers wherein instances have been cited, of demise of the deductee/collectee on or before 31.05.2024 and before the option to link PAN and Aadhaar could have been exercised, the Circular provides that there shall be no liability on the deductor/collector to deduct/collect the tax under section 206AA/206CC of the Act, as the case may be pertaining to the transactions entered into up to March 31, 2024,” an official statement read.

In view of the genuine difficulties being faced by the taxpayers, the CBDT issued the Circular dated 05.08.2024, and vide the same, the government has relaxed the provisions of TDS/TCS as per the Income-tax Act, 1961, in the event of death of deductee/collectee before linking of PAN and Aadhaar, it added.

India's homegrown automotive company Tata Motors launched its new vehicle Tata Curvv EV in the SUV segment on Wednesday with prices ranging from Rs 17.49 lakh to Rs 21.99 lakh (ex-showroom).

Tata Curvv EV offers two battery pack choices to its customers - 40.5kWh and 55kWh - which provide a range of 502 km and 585 km (ARAI certified, MIDC Part 1), respectively. It can touch 0-100km/h in 8.6 seconds.

The company said its specially designed fast-charging capability ensures a top-up of 150 km range in just 15 minutes.

After three days of fall, Indian frontline indices Sensex and Nifty closed on a positive note on Wednesday after Bank of Japan (BoJ) Deputy Governor's comment that it won’t hike rates when markets are unstable, which led to optimism in the international markets as well.

At close on Wednesday, Sensex was at 79,468, up 874 points or 1.11 per cent, while Nifty was up 304 points or 1.27 per cent at 24,297.

On the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), 2,988 shares closed in the green, 945 shares in the red, and 98 shares without any change, which shows that the trend in the market remains positive.

Driven by strong end-user demand and healthy affordability, the residential sales in the top seven cities are expected to witness double-digit growth in FY2025 and the outlook on the residential real estate sector is stable, a report showed on Wednesday

The residential sales witnessed a healthy growth of 19 per cent in FY24 (year-on-year).

Credit rating agency ICRA said it expects the area sold in the top seven cities to increase by 10-12 per cent to 785-800 million square feet in FY2025, on a high base of FY2024.

As disposable incomes rise amid overall economic growth, India’s lifestyle market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 10-12 per cent to reach $210 billion by 2028, according to a report.

It is currently valued at $130 billion in 2023, stated the report by Bain & Company and Myntra that provides a comprehensive overview of the evolving e-lifestyle landscape in the country.

It showed that the country’s online fashion and lifestyle market will grow from $16-17 billion to $40-45 billion by 2028.

The report added that the penetration of e-commerce in the lifestyle sector will increase from the current 13 per cent to 18-22 per cent by 2028. This means about one in five dollars spent on lifestyle will be online.

Currently, more than 175 million Indians shop online for lifestyle products and make an average of 6-7 transactions per year.

The Unified Payments Interface (UPI) platform, a flagship of the Indian Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) which has gone global, has added another feather to its cap.

According to Dilip Asbe, Managing Director and CEO of the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), credit card spendings via UPI has touched Rs 10,000 crore a month.

The NPCI CEO also informed that credit lines on UPI account has reached about Rs 100-Rs 200 crore, as the remainder comes from the RuPay credit card on UPI facility.

According to him, ICICI Bank is one of the leading banks offering credit on UPI, with other five to six lenders live on the platform.

The recent electric vehicle fire incidents involving Mercedes-Benz and Kia models could not have come at a worse time for the local automotive industry, which has been eagerly preparing to introduce ambitious new electric models to tackle the so-called EV adoption chasm.

While waiting for the official investigation results, the industry is fretting over the spike in consumers' doubts over the safety of what are supposed to be cutting-edge, advanced cars for the future, reports news agency.

The latest scare surrounding electric cars started last Thursday, when a Mercedes-Benz EQE vehicle caught fire in an underground parking garage inside an apartment complex in Incheon, 27 kms west of Seoul.

The government has warned access service providers and their delivery telemarketers to come forward and take effective measures to curb bulk communications and spam using voice calls.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) held a meeting with the industry stakeholders in the national capital to discuss action on spammers, amid growing consumer complaints about unsolicited commercial calls.

According to the government, the deliberations were on instances of misuse of headers and content templates without the knowledge of entities.

The stakeholders also discussed steps taken by access service providers and delivery telemarketers to identify and trace the entities responsible for sending such messages and to take corrective measures to prevent such cases.

They also informed about the control of promotion calls whether robotic calls, auto-dialler calls or pre-recorded calls, and migration of all such enterprise business customers on the Distributed ledger technology (DLT) platform for sending bulk communication in compliance with the TRAI regulations.

Retail sales of passenger vehicles in India, including cars and SUVs, posted a 10 per cent jump to 3,20,129 vehicles in July this year compared to 2,90,564 in the same month last year, driven by new model launches and higher discounts, according to the Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations (FADA).

“Dealers reported benefits from good product availability, attractive schemes, and a wider range of products,” the Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations (FADA) Vice President C S Vigneshwar said in a statement.

Heavy rains, low consumer sentiment, and intense competition posed challenges but dealers managed to sustain sales through strong promotions and incremental discounts, he added.

However, Vigneshwar also pointed out that the growth is accompanied by high inventory levels which have surged to a historic high of 67-72 days, equivalent to Rs 73,000 crore worth of stock.

In a fillip to the ‘Make in India’ initiative, contract manufacturing company Zetwerk on Monday made it official to partner with Bengaluru-based electronics manufacturing services firm, Smile Electronics, to launch three factories for IT hardware production in the country.

Located near Bengaluru, the Devanahalli factory has fully automated production lines equipped for assembling, testing, and packing desktops, laptops, energy metres and remote controls.

The other two factories will come up in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh.

“This collaboration is further strengthened by Acer India's commitment to the 'Make in India' initiative, emphasising the importance of local manufacturing and innovation,” said Harish Kohli, Managing Director of Acer India who inaugurated the Devanahalli factory.