Exclusive: Society of Indian Law Firms (SILF) chairman Lalit Bhasin has condemned the expanded service tax rules on law firms, saying that SILF and other law firms would file a new writ petition against the changes while the existing writ petition remained pending in the Bombay High Court.
Bhasin (pictured) told Legally India that there had been “no movement” on the writ petition that is pending in the Bombay High Court that was filed in November 2009.
On today’s Union Budget tax changes that would also pull advocates and arbitrators into the tax net when servicing businesses, as well as make law firms pay service tax on legal services rendered to individuals, he said: “The implications do not seem to have been understood by the budget makers.
“We’ll definitely be challenging [it in a writ] – SILF also and some individual law firms. It affects our right to carry out our profession. It’s also bad for advocates – it’s bad for the entire legal profession. I won’t be surprised if this may also create a lot of unrest in the legal profession.”
He also slammed the new proposal to make service tax payable as soon as a bill is raised and not when it was paid. “I think that is quite a retrograde step,” Bhasin commented. “So many times you don’t receive the payments, clients can negotiate and all that. It will be very cumbersome – if at all it has to be [paid] it is only when you receive [the money] – it can not be at the initial stage: you are raising an invoice and then paying tax on it.”
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All he and his ilk, SILF, just want to eat, eat, eat.
[...].
"We [should] definitely be challenging SILF also and some individual law firms. It affects our right to carry out our profession. It’s also bad for advocates – it’s bad for the entire legal profession. I won’t be surprised if this (i.e. SILF) creates a lot of unrest in the legal profession."
Ban SILF. They're one of the prime reasons for India's legal profession being a wreck.
and just because we are lawyer we will not pay tax.. sound unhealthy
LI why do u censor comments against SILF? its freedom of speech. if u have the guts conduct a poll among students and youngsters asking how many support SILF on foreign firms, foreign universities, new regulatory body etc
Individual lawyers will be the worst hit. While the idea was perhaps to target the Big Guns who as individuals charge fees in in crores every year, but what has been done is going to hit the practice of budding indivudals. What happens to the small individual lawyers as there will be no cost advantage? As it is big firms have no problems and even if they hike rates by 10 or 20% big corproates will pay. Now they are creating a divide as the cost advantage that helps small lawyers come up in the profession will be lost. Hence even if you are an indivudal lawyer, there is no scope for growth as the cost advantage is lost. Corporates would rather go to big firms and not to individuals.
This is a conspiracy by big law firms to ensure small individual lawyers do not grow as they can provide quality services at 10% cheaper fees minus the servie tax. Now this will be lost. So the big firms grow bigger and no room for indivudal excellence. While SME's and entreprenurial skills were to be promoted, this appears to be clearly contradictory to the Government policy.
I think that this is nothing more than a 'publicity' gimmik.
Established Seniors continue to treat freshers like dirt or worse.. Large law-firms would rather a "connected" fresher join them. To become an employee after your study law is meaningless and a slap on your own education..
There should be a total rebate from payment of taxes for the first 5/7 years of one's practice OR age 30, whichever is earlier.
The concern to me is something bigger. The judiciary is one institution which is becoming the biggest thorn in the flesh of the corrupt politicos. There is nothing we can expect from them, except steps to further demoralize people who form part of the justice delivery system, esp "uncontrollable elements" like us lawyers.
I am sure that large law-firms are much easier for the political system to manage because they can have "arrangements" with politicos and swing deal after deal of great value.
But true depth and integrity of the system can only come through lawyers who may appear to be idiosyncratic but who ask truly relevant and uncomfortable questions..
But I guess, like Henry Ford, they believe we can be any color -so long as it is Black!
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