Industry & Economy
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Taxation
VAT: Bengal trade body to observe hunger strike
Our Bureau
Kolkata
,
March 14
THE Federation of West Bengal Trade Associations (FWBTA) has decided to observe an All-Bengal hunger strike on March 17, protesting against the introduction of VAT from April 1, without giving due weightage to the demands of the FWBTA and other all-India trade associations. The federation has also decided to observe a 72-hour all-India trade bandh beginning March 30.
Addressing newspersons here on Monday on the agitation programme, Mr Mahesh Singhania, senior member of the FWBTA, said the hunger strike and trade bandh were being observed on an all-India basis, called by the national bodies such as the Confederation of All India Trade and Bharatiya Vyapar Udyog Mandali. He said imposition of VAT will lead to difficulties for traders to issue cash memos, even a small sale from across the counter.
It will also cause an increase in the cost of the essential commodities by anything between 25 and 40 per cent. He also felt it will unleash an intensive inspector-raj on the trade, prompting even honest traders to resort to corruption. The traders will face heavy penalties alongwith jail custody even for small clerical mistakes in the return forms, he feared.
Mr Singhania clarified that VAT alongwith CST and various other taxes would impose a heavy burden on the trade.
He felt placing the onus of payment of service tax on service receiving traders was highly unethical. Questioning the logic behind the proposed cash withdrawal tax, he said "why should a depositor pay even the smallest fraction of charges for his own deposited, tax-paid white money, and that too as many times".
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