Excise exemption for construction materials enables refund claims by approved agencies rebuilding tsunami-affected houses under specified conditions.
Exemption applies to cement and steel used in constructing houses (including temporary shelters) in specified tsunami affected areas when used by approved construction agencies for rehabilitation. Manufacturers must pay duty at clearance; approved agencies may claim refunds quarterly from the jurisdictional excise officer with statements, proof of duty payment, consumption certificates, and on completion a District Collector completion certificate and consolidated consumption certificate certified by a Chartered Engineer. Refunds are sanctioned at six percent of construction cost subject to per house maxima and are payable only to the approved construction agency for houses built between 1 April 2005 and 31 December 2008.

Research deduction eligibility: approval enables donors' deductions subject to accounting and audit certification requirements for social science research.
Approval of Centre for Research in Rural & Industrial Development (CRRID) under Section 35(1)(iii) is notified for the period 1-4-2001 to 31-3-2004 as a university/college or institution partly engaged in research. Conditions require maintenance of separate accounts for research, submission of audited Income and Expenditure accounts for each approved year to the tax authority by the return due date or within ninety days of the notification, and an auditor's certificate specifying amounts qualifying donors for deduction and certifying that expenditure was for social science/statistical research.

Cost Inflation Index framework updates the indexed-cost table for financial year 2005-06 under capital gains computation rules.
Cost Inflation Index for financial year 2005-06 was specified under the Explanation to section 48 of the Income-tax Act, 1961. The existing Cost Inflation Index table was amended by inserting the applicable index for that financial year, based on the prescribed proportion of the average increase in the Consumer Price Index for urban non-manual employees during the preceding financial year.

Exemption amendment alters tariff entries, removing a previously listed heading and retaining the remaining headings in the exemption schedule.
Amendment to a central excise exemption notification substitutes the tariff figures in the Table against a specified serial entry so that one previously listed tariff heading is omitted and the remaining headings are retained, effectuating a targeted administrative change to the exemption schedule as issued by notification on 12 August 2005.

Import prohibition on avian and related animal products from outbreak countries enforced until further orders to protect animal health.
Amendment to Condition 16 of Chapter I A prohibits import of specified livestock, poultry and avian-origin products from countries reporting Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza, listing blanket bans on certain birds, unprocessed avian meat and bird semen, and additional prohibitions including live poultry, hatching eggs, egg products, feathers, pig meat products, pathological and biological materials from birds, and animal origin products for feed, agricultural or industrial use; the prohibition remains in force until further orders.

Permissible external exposure limit increased relative to net worth; retrospective effect clarified, no adverse impact on persons.
Amendment raises the permissible exposure ceiling for transfers or issues of foreign securities by substituting a higher cap tied to an entity's net worth in the operative provision and its explanatory text, expanding permitted foreign security exposure; the change is issued by the central banking authority with retrospective commencement and a clarification that no person will be adversely affected.

Adjudication power allocation for service tax penalties assigns adjudicative limits to officers by rank, with specified exceptions.
Adjudication power for penalties under Chapter V is delegated to Central Excise officers in graded bands by rank, with Superintendents, Assistant Commissioners/Deputy Commissioners, Joint/Additional Commissioners, and Commissioners allocated progressively greater authority to adjudge service tax or CENVAT credit specified in notices. The delegation excludes matters on taxability, valuation, and extended limitation cases, and does not apply where prior Chapter V decisions have been referred back for fresh adjudication. The notification takes effect on publication and has been subsequently amended to restructure banding and officer designations.

Determination of taxable turnover - apportioned percentages for composite hotel charges and new refund security notice introduced.
Rule 4A prescribes percentage allocations of a composite lodging-and-meals charge to determine the taxable turnover of residential hotels, with the percentage varying by inclusion of breakfast, lunch, dinner or their combinations, and allows reduction where documentary evidence proves a lower taxable component. Rule 34 is amended to require orders for withholding refunds or demanding security to be issued in Form DVAT 22A. Annexure I reduces the fee payable for an application for determination of a specific question to a lower fixed amount. The rules are effective immediately.

VAT Third Schedule amendment revises specified rate tax scope by adding, substituting and omitting listed goods.
Amendment to the Delhi VAT Third Schedule revises the list of goods subject to the specified concessional tax rate by substituting certain serial entries, omitting others, removing qualifying words from an IT entry, inserting additional industrial input headings (including electroplating chemicals and layflat tubing), clarifying packaged dairy items, and adding numerous goods such as abrasives, household plastic items, fittings and fasteners, scrap, paint brushes, wood products, insulated varnish and tractor tyres, effective 08.08.2005.

VAT exemption list amended, substituting specified entries and adding exemptions for leaf plates, paper waste and incense sticks.
Amendment to the First Schedule of the Delhi Value Added Tax Act substitutes the entry at serial No. 1 to exempt manually operated or animal driven agricultural implements (including spare parts, components and accessories), replaces serial No. 58 with pappad and vadi, and inserts entries for leaf plates and cups, paper waste, and incense sticks commonly known as agarbati, dhup kathi or dhup bati.

Specification of India Millennium Deposits as qualifying deposits under section 10 clause 15, defining their tax classification.
The Central Government specifies India Millennium Deposits as deposits for the purposes of clause (15) of section 10 of the Income Tax Act; these are bank instruments representing foreign currency denominated deposits issued in the form of promissory notes by a bank constituted under the State Bank of India Act and are thereby classified as deposits under the statutory sub clause.

Exemption under section 35AC: Government approves institutions and specifies eligible projects and deductible costs for three financial years.
Central Government approves specified charitable and welfare institutions and, for each, specifies eligible projects or schemes together with estimated project costs and the maximum portion of those costs allowable as deductions under the tax exemption regime; the approvals and deduction caps operate for a fixed three year period in relation to three consecutive financial years, and subsequent notes record substitutions and an omission affecting table entries.

Renewal of recognition under Securities Contracts (Regulation) Act: OTC Exchange authorised for a one-year term subject to conditions.
The Securities and Exchange Board of India grants renewal of recognition to the OTC Exchange of India under the Securities Contracts (Regulation) Act for a defined limited period in respect of contracts in securities, subject to conditions prescribed or imposed by the regulator and conditional on compliance with regulatory oversight.

Compliance date amendment extends the statutory compliance deadline under a Companies Act notification.
The Central Government amends the earlier notification under the Companies Act to substitute the figures for the compliance date in clause (5) of the Explanation to paragraph 1, replacing the previously stated compliance date with a new compliance date in the notification's table, thereby formally extending the period for compliance under that provision.

Customs notification amendment clarifies unloading of imported goods and loading of export goods in Jammu and Kashmir.
Amendment substitutes the entry for serial number 7 (Jammu and Kashmir) in the Table to Notification No. 61/94 Customs (N.T.) to read: unloading of imported goods and the loading of export goods or any class of such goods, effected by the Central Board of Excise and Customs under powers conferred by the Customs Act, 1962, as a clarification of the scope of the non tariff notification.

Tariff value fixation: notification updates per metric tonne tariff values for specified edible oils and brass scrap.
The Board, exercising Section 14(2) powers under the Customs Act, substitutes the existing tariff value Table in Notification No.36/2001-Cus (N.T.) by Notification No.70/2005-Customs (N.T.), specifying per metric tonne US dollar tariff values for listed goods including categories of palm oil, palmolein, crude soybean oil, and brass scrap, with certain entries noted as unchanged.

Advance ruling on determination of origin for resident importers under India-Singapore CECA enables pre-import clarity on origin.
Specifies a resident as an eligible applicant proposing to import goods from the Republic of Singapore under the Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement and who may seek an advance ruling on the determination of origin of those goods, enabling a pre import administrative determination of origin to assist importers in ascertaining eligibility for preferential treatment under the CECA.

Export policy amendment removes shell or nut charcoal from export classification, narrowing the Schedule 2 wood charcoal entry.
The amendment deletes the words "(including Shell or Nut Charcoal)" from the Schedule 2 Export Policy entry for H.S. Code 44020010 (Sl. No. 145) under the Heading "Wood and Articles of Wood; Wood Charcoal," thereby narrowing the export classification for that H.S. code.

Effective date of FTP notifications: earlier FTP notifications take effect from 1 October 2005 under statutory authority.
The Central Government, exercising statutory power under the Foreign Trade Act and the Foreign Trade Policy framework, partially modifies earlier FTP notifications and declares that Notification No.12/(2004-2009) and Notification No.24/(2004-2009) shall come into effect on 1 October 2005, recording that the action is taken in the public interest and citing the departmental file reference.

Prohibited transactions clarified: Schedules amended to label prohibited and approval-required current account transactions under FEMA.
Central Government amended the Foreign Exchange Management (Current Account Transactions) Rules, 2000 by substituting the bracketed references in Schedule I and Schedule II with explicit labels: Schedule I now reads "Transactions which are Prohibited (see rule 3)" and Schedule II now reads "Transactions which require prior approval of the Central Government (see Rule 4)"; the amendment is titled the 2005 Amendment Rules and comes into force upon publication in the Official Gazette.