New Delhi – Prime Minister Narendra Modi advised his taxmen to try and work towards getting the small traders with a turnover of less than ₹ 20 lakh registered for the goods and services tax. He also mentioned that his government was working towards the aim of creating an environment which shatters and breaks the confidence of all the corrupt people and inculcates the confidence among the honest tax payers for good.
He mentioned in his speech to the tax administrators of both the centre and the state that to let all the traders gain maximum from the GST, the government needs to work towards getting the small traders under the purview of GST. By small traders, he meant any trader whose annual turnover was less than ₹ 20 lakh. He was addressing at the two days Rajasva Gyan Sangam in New Delhi.
He asked the tax officers to make efforts towards this direction and formulate a system for this category of dealers as well. Presently all the traders who have an annual income less than ₹ 20 lakh are not required to register under the goods and services tax as they are exempted from paying any form of indirect tax.
He added that the implementation of the GST has helped bring transparency into the economy. Since the GST came into the picture (from 1st July 2017), as many as 17 lakh new traders have been brought under the umbrella of an indirect tax system, which mostly pertains to GST.
In one of the most excited statements during his speech, he added that the officers should start using data analytics tools very proactively so that they can track the tax defaulters and thus determine the undisclosed income and wealth. Adding to the data analytics, he advised the human resource board in the tax department, to strengthen the data analytics and the investigation wing by using various tools and thus that would help make sense out of the data. He was of the view that human intervention should be as minimum as possible when dealing with the issues related to tax.
The honest cannot be just paying tax and keep watching; they have been paying the price of the misdeeds of many, Mr. Modi added. The government has already been tracing people and taking various steps such as demonetization and the implementation of various strict laws again corruption and black money. He also mentioned the pains that the tax officers take each year to estimate the amount of tax to be received annually as in, how much of tax should have accrued in the system but was not realized. He said that the officers should come up with a time bound yet an efficient and effective solution which discloses the tax raised but not realized. He expressed his anger and disquiet towards the huge pending cases about tax filings.
Mr. Modi said a huge amount of money that is left locked in the pending cases could be easily used for the welfare and the development of the economy and the poor. He asked his officers to come up with an action plan as soon as possible and try and change the work culture they work in by incorporating a sense of urgency in their overall corporate network.
Mr. Modi target is to clear majority of the pending cases and thus improve the country’s tax administrative by 2022, which is the 75th Independence anniversary of the country. He is hoping that the two-day Rajasva Gyan Sangam would help officers come up with concrete ideas to improve the overall tax administration of the country.
