BOX LETTER
Parliament in turmoil
The winter session of the Parliament has been a complete washout and both the Houses of the legislative body were held to ransom over the issue of demonetization. The XV Lok Sabha saw the Opposition BJP always disrupting the House and the Opposition in the XVI Lok Sabha seems to have taken a cue for the XV Lok Sabha's Opposition. It was seen during the winter session that even the treasury benches resorted to disrupting the Rajya Sabha.
While political parties will always blame each other for the disruptions, the nation's resources which are financed by the honest tax payer are being wasted. The Presiding Officers need to be more strict and the rules of procedure need to be amended to state that even a small adjournment in the House will lead to all members of the House forfeiting their allowance and salary for that day. The marshalls need to be used if need be to evict mischief-making MPs.
K B Dessai, Fatorda
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The many write-ups which have recently appeared in the media about the tax notice to the Church authorities in Goa have not yet cleared the issue whether the Church in Goa with its affiliated bodies/ institutions like Fabricas, Cofres and Confrarias in the parishes are subject to income tax payment. It has been stated by writers that temples are exempted from I-T in Goa under the Portuguese Act on Mazanias still in force. A few have even raised the issue of discrimination.
It is to be noted that the Church in Goa is also exempted from paying any kind of tax under the agreement between Holy See and Portuguese State called of the year 1940. The decree No 35461 dated October 20, 1946, has given its full effect to the same in Goa. Number 8 of the said Concordata exempts the Church from the payment of any kind of tax to the State. This Concordata has been upheld by the Bombay High Court (Goa branch) in more than one case from 1980’s and as recently as 2013.
The reason for exempting the temples and churches from the purview of IT is that these are not profit-making institutions. Whatever funds are generated by way of gifts/ donations or income from properties is meant for the day-to-day maintenance of the cult, priests, payment of the other staff serving in these institutions, works of charity, upkeep of the buildings and their timely repairs which today amounts to crores of rupees. All these aims are to be met without further burdening the already overburdened followers of these cults.
Visitacao B Monteiro, Old Goa
