SC orders Ncell, Axiata to pay Rs 38b capital gains tax

Kathmandu / Feb 6: Supreme Court has ordered telecom company Ncell to pay Rs 38 billion capital gains tax to the government.

Issuing a mandamus on the writ of the alleged capital gains tax evasion by private telecom corporation Ncell, on Wednesday, a full bench led by Chief Justice Cholendra Shamsher Rana and comprised of Justices Meera Khadka, Bishwambhar Shrestha, Dr Ananda Mohan Bhattarai and Tanka Bahadur Moktan ordered the telecommunication company to deposit the amount.

The private telecom company had been facing allegations of evading profit tax while repatriating a sum of income to its home country. The court had been testing whether Ncell evaded tax while repatriating a profit of Rs 70 billion to its home country.

A single bench of justice of the apex court had granted the permission to repatriate the amount. Even though NCell had already taken Rs 24.5 billion out of Nepal, a group of civil society members led by social activist Dwarika Nath Dhungana filed a writ petition against repatriating the amount while NCell and Reinhold Holdings had filed another writ petition seeking an apex court permission to repatriate the amount.

Ncell was sold various times from 2001 to 2011 and has been facing allegations of evading billions of rupees in taxes.