Vodafone’s top lawyer in India has quit after being tangled up in a four-year long tax avoidance scandal. The row has seen the Indian government bullied by its biggest foreign corporate investor — but officials are not giving up on extracting $2.6bn from the company.
Executive Andre Jerome led Vodafone’s defence against the Indian government, which imposed a $2.6bn tax bill on them for the takeover of Indian mobile interests from Hong-Kong based Hutchison Whampoa in 2007. Having lost a case in the Supreme Court, officials are looking to introduce retroactive legislation to recoup the cash.
The dogged determination of Indian authorities stands in marked contrast to Britain’s HMRC, who let Vodafone off tax bills of up to £7bn after senior civil servants — such as permanent secretary Dave Hartnett — were lunched to within an inch of their lives.
On tax enforcement, Britain could learn a lot from its former colony.
