Category: Industry
Sri Lanka’s Jayasuriya announces retirement
Mar. 31 (AFP) – Sri Lanka’s veteran opening batsman Sanath Jayasuriya Friday said he would retire from Test cricket after next week’s match against Pakistan. -Amal Jayasinghe: win98win@ “I thought about it long and hard and decided that’s it. It’s a very emotional moment, but I guess every good thing has to come to an […]
Neat Fit
Mar. 30 (LBO) – The open source middleware start up WSO2 said Thursday that its WSO2 Tungsten product is fully interoperable with Microsoft’s upcoming Vista operating system. WSO2 is an open source company, which has offices in Boston, USA and a development centre in Sri Lanka. “Our efforts are proving that open source middleware technologies […]
Buying Time
Mar. 30 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Commercial Bank of Ceylon Thursday put off its annual and extraordinary general meetings till next week, as shareholder attendance fell short of the required quorum. The lack of a quorum is due to a court order which restricted the voting powers of some of Commercial Bank’s key shareholders including […]
Costly Plastic
Mar. 30 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s treasury secretary P B Jayasundara has asked the two state banks to step up credit card sales to public servants, following hefty salary increments this year. Under a recent government circular, those working in low and middle level jobs got a 25 percent pay hike, while medical services got […]
Extended Invitation
Mar. 29 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Department of Inland Revenue is giving three extra months to pay back-taxes without facing penalties.Newly appointed Inland Revenue Chief A A Wijepala said those who did not have tax files earlier but register to pay tax this year, would not be questioned about their incomes in previous years. In […]
Expensive Joke
Mar. 29 (LBO) – Sri Lanka will introduce stamp duties from April on a range of services like credit cards, leasing and insurance policies, as the government looks for ways to raise revenue to pay for infrastructure and welfare spending plans. -Mel Gunasekera: mel@ Exemption list: Insurance policy on: Life, Medical Plant, machinery and equipment […]
Filling Gaps
A fast track program to give non-tech graduates jobs in the IT field has paid off, with a first batch of students finding full time work in top companies. The four month program by the Moratuwa University gives graduates from other fields marketable skills like computer programming, web design, networking and business know how. Surveys […]
Damage Control
Mar. 27 (LBO) – Sri Lanka may impose a cess of up to 10 percent on imports to plug a loss in tax revenues, when import tariffs are lowered in April under the Indo-Lanka free trade deal.“Cesses will be used in the future to mitigate the negative impact of the increased preference for imports from […]
Audit Protest
Mar.26 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s government auditors are threatening industrial action against chronic inaction by authorities and the parliament to crackdown on corruption and other shortcomings highlighted by them.The angry tones follows a statement attributed to the treasury secretary, which appeared in a Sunday weekly, criticising the audit report for having brought disrepute the public […]
Joint Power
Mar. 23 (LBO) — Sri Lanka’s cabinet of ministers had approved a deal for the state-owned Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) to team up with India’s National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) in a joint venture coal plant, Power Minister John Seneviratne said Wednesday.The cabinet has approved the provisions of a draft Memorandum of Understanding, which will […]
Drama Tax
Mar 23 (LBO) – Sri Lanka passed controversial laws on Tuesday to tax imported movies, dramas, sitcoms and commercials, though tax rates and conditions have not yet been decided.The law makes way for a Teledrama, Film and Commercials levy on imports of all television stations as well as commercials made out of the country and […]
Open Sesame
Mar 23 (LBO) – Sri Lanka will have to further relax import tariffs on goods like cement from April this year under its trade deal with India, with customs revenues taking a hit.Sri Lanka’s bilateral trade agreements with both India and Pakistan allow for a phasing out of tariffs over a eight year period, for […]