As the issue of corruption has come to the central stage with the government under attack on the Lokpal and black money related matters, the focus again shifts to the Supreme Court with the Centre expected to submit its update on the progress of its action related to unaccounted money in foreign banks.
Though a bench of Justice B. Sudershan Reddy and S.S. Nijjar had reserved its verdict on May 4 on the plea by several petitioners for setting up of a special investigating team (SIT) to go into the entire gamut of the black money, including the case against country’s biggest tax evader Hasan Ali and his associates, the verdict is not listed for pronouncement on Monday.
The verdict is expected on any day during the week as Justice Reddy, who heads the bench, will be retiring on July 8 and he is supposed to pronounce it before his superannuation.
Since the Supreme Court would continue to monitor the investigation even after pronouncing the verdict on SIT, Justice Reddy before had asked the government law officer to apprise the court about the further progress of its action on the issue. Solicitor General Gopal Subramaniam, who had opposed the demand for setting up of SIT, had promised to submit a further status report on the government’s latest action.
The government is expected to inform the court about further progress on double taxation avoidance agreement with Switzerland, the biggest tax heaven where bulk of the unaccounted money of Indians is stashed. DTAA with Switzerland had become crucial as the Centre had told the court that the Swiss government was only willing to reveal information about “black accounts” under the agreement.
The government had also stated that the DTAA issue was being taken up through diplomatic channels with other notable tax heaves.
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ATC snag hits flights
Age Correspondent
Mumbai
July 3: Several flights were affected at the Mumbai airport on Sunday as a new Air Traffic Control software that was undergoing a test run failed to kick in. “Though four departures from Mumbai were delayed, no arrivals were affected. The Auto Trac-III went into degraded mode of operation from 3.10 am to 5 am,” said G. Dasgupta, joint general manager, air traffic control (Mumbai).