The Hindu Business Line : CVC, Vote India to conduct workshop on indirect taxes

VOTE India, an alliance of civil society groups, and the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) will organise a two-day workshop on reforming the Central Excise Department here from Wednesday.

The workshop, titled `Plucking feathers without hissing - Procedural improvements in indirect taxes,' will be attended by the Central Vigilance Commissioner, Mr P. Shankar.

It will focus on the simplification of Customs, Central Excise and service tax procedures to improve governance.

Addressing a press conference here on Monday, Dr Jayaprakash Narayan, National Coordinator of Lok Satta (a constituent of Vote India), said Vote India had already prepared draft recommendations in this regard.

Simplified procedures would reduce the burden on assessees by improving the quality of governance.

"It will also lead to growth of the country," he said.

"These have been forwarded to the CVC and Central Board of Excise and Customs and other stakeholders," he said.

"We have interacted with officials, tax consultants and the industry to prepare the draft recommendations."

Vote India's recommendations broadly cover structural issues, inspections, audit, adjudication, penalties and accountability. Dr Narayan said functions are overlapping with seven different agencies performing similar jobs. "This results in great inconvenience to the assessee," he said.

To avoid this, the Commissionerate, Preventive, Anti-Evasion and Audit departments should be merged. On inspections, Vote India felt that the right to enter the premises should be restricted. Multiple inspections by several agencies keep the staff engaged, leading to disruption of work.

"It should be allowed in a few select cases like audit or for carrying out audit," he said. Vote India also called for a simplified form for maintaining records.

These recommendations will come up for discussion during the workshop. The second workshop will be held in Mumbai.

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