Mauritius Denies Plans To Renegotiate DTA With India
Mauritius’s Ministry of Finance has denied that there are plans for a renegotiation of the jurisdiction’s double tax agreement with India in the near future.
The Ministry stated: “Further to press articles alleging that Mauritius and India are to begin a fresh round of negotiations to amend the Double Taxation Avoidance Convention, the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development wishes to inform that it has not received any correspondence to that effect from New Delhi and formally denies this information. The Ministry has furthermore contacted the Indian High Commission in Port Louis and they have also strongly denied the information circulated in the press.”
The two countries did, however, ratify a protocol to the agreement in August of this year. In addition to boosting tax information exchange and facilitating the more efficient collection of taxes, the protocol provided clarification on taxing rights relating to capital gains.
Speaking at the time of the Protocol’s signature, in May 2017, India’s Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) explained that: “The protocol will tackle the long-pending issues of treaty abuse and round-tripping of funds attributed to the India-Mauritius treaty, curb revenue loss, prevent double non-taxation, streamline the flow of investment, and stimulate the flow of exchange of information between India and Mauritius.”
