No dilution in recent policy decisions: Kaushik Basu

New Delhi: Amid the Prime Minister's Office seeking clarifications from the Finance Ministry on tax matters, including retrospective amendments, Chief Economic Advisor Kaushik Basu on Friday said there has been no dilution in any of the recent policy decisions.

"I don't think that any policy step (of recent months) has been diluted," he told reporters at a function here.

"The message we were giving actually for last couple of months, including during the time when Pranab Mukherjee was the Finance Minister, is the same message, that we want this industry to do well and we want to be as cooperative as possible," he added.

Kaushik Basu\'s comments come amid the PMO seeking clarifications from the Finance Ministry on tax matters.

On Thursday, PMO had asked the Finance Ministry to clear the air on contentious tax proposals, including retrospective amendment of the I-T Act which required Vodafone to pay of Rs 20,000 crore in taxes and interest.

The PMO, meanwhile appears to have distanced itself from the General Anit-Avoidance Rules (GAAR) draft guidelines posted by the Finance Ministry on Thursday saying that were not seen by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and would be finalized only after his approval.

Retrospective amendments to tax laws and GAAR provisions introduced by the then Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee through the Budget led to widespread criticism from both domestic as well as global investors.

GAAR implementation, which has been deferred by one year to April 2013, is aimed at checking tax evasion.

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