With Goods and Services Tax (GST) officers under pressure to exceed the Rs 1-trillion collection mark per month, industry has faced a barrage of recovery notices and summons issued over the last one month across sectors, according to company executives. Industry bodies have claimed harassment by field officers, blocking of input tax credit, cancellation of GST registration, threats of arrest and steep penalties, impacting their working capital and operations. Company executives pointed at an atmosphere of apprehension and fear due to such notices and summons.

The income tax (I-T) department on Tuesday extended the deadline for filing settlement applications for eligible taxpayers till September 30, as the income tax settlement commission (ITSC) ceased to exist from February 1. This comes amid interim relief provided by some high courts, directing acceptance of applications of settlement even after February 1. To dispose the pending settlement applications as on January 31, the central government has constituted Interim Board for Settlement.

'The kind of tax which will be generated from the second pillar may far outweigh what we may be losing in the first pillar.'

Amid economic uncertainties owing to the pandemic, the government's key revenue agency, the Income Tax Department, has close to 400 vacancies at commissioner level and above, affecting its functioning. Seventy-three of the 91 chief commissioner positions are lying vacant, with some for more than a year. Chief commissioner is the second-highest post in the department, below principal chief commissioner, which is at par with secretary in a ministry.

India conceding ground to bring only top 100 digital companies like Google, Facebook, and Netflix into the global taxation pact may have revenue implications. This will mean that New Delhi will have to withdraw the contentious 2 per cent equalisation levy on e-commerce operators by 2023. This may have revenue implications for India, experts pointed out, as the equalisation levy has a much lower annual revenue threshold of Rs 2 crore (euro 0.2 million) as against euro 20 billion agreed by 130 countries at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). India, along with other developing countries, was pitching for at least euro 1 billion threshold to cover at least 5,000 global entities. India collected Rs 2,057 crore from the equalisation levy in 2020-21, an 85 per cent growth over Rs 1,136 crore in the previous fiscal.

'From the tiniest to mid-level organisations and even some at the lower end of the large-scale ones would say that computerisation and the extensive documentation and regulatory requirements for GST have made the compliance process worse in many cases.'

The vacancies are learnt to be impacting the I-T department's day-to-day functioning.

GST mop-up likely to fall in May, June after touching record levels in April and March.

E-way bill generation, which is related to paying Goods and Services Tax (GST) and a key high-frequency indicator of economic activity, may have fallen to a five-month low in April as more cities experience lockdowns due to a surge in Covid-19 cases. In April e-way bill generation may decline to 55-58 million, which is the lowest since at least November. On the higher side, it is a 17 per cent decline over March.

The group has called for a retaliatory tariff action against India, if New Delhi does not roll back the 'unilateral and discriminatory' equalisation levy or Google Tax.

In addition to this confusion, classification issues, revenue biases in rulings, delays in disposing of applications, and lack of senior officers in AARs have made the advance ruling mechanism under GST unpopular among industry players, reports Dilasha Seth.

'Personal income tax collections have been high on account of impressive advance tax mop-up.'

Other decisions piled up include rationalisation of GST rate slabs, correction of inverted duty on certain items and inclusion of petroleum products.

Providing comfort to the government on the revenue front amid fiscal stress, direct tax collection is moving closer to the revised Budget target for 2021-21 and may get a further thrust from the last instalment of the advance tax payment, the deadline for which ended on Monday. The contraction in net direct tax collection narrowed to 5 per cent year-on-year as on March 15 compared to a 9 per cent decline seen in January. In absolute terms, net collection stood at Rs 8.2 trillion against Rs 8.67 trillion in the same period last year, according to the provisional numbers shared by a government official.

Many states are open to the idea of petrol and diesel being brought under the goods and services tax (GST) regime - contrary to the perception that they are averse to it - but they want a concrete proposal, including a compensation mechanism, from the Centre. West Bengal Finance Minister Amit Mitra says while the issue can be discussed, the Centre may not be keen to bring the change because it earns "much more" from taxes on petrol and diesel. "(The peak rate of) GST is 28 per cent. Under the regime, the Centre would only get 14 per cent. "So, definitely, the Union government does not want GST on fuel. It is all lies. Currently, they are in a very cozy place," Mitra said.

The number of centrally sponsored schemes have increased to 35 in FY22 from 30 in FY21 and central sector schemes have increased to 704 from 685 in the previous year, reports Dilasha Seth.

The Budget proposed abolishing the under-performing, authority of advance ruling, to replace it with a two-member board of advance ruling.

'It is just an excuse to say that the Centre has run out of money.' 'Pruning these schemes would mean hard time for the people of India.'

While the tax-to-GDP ratio of 9.88 per cent has been assumed for FY21, the same as last year, when it touched a decadal low, for FY22 a ratio of 10.7 per cent has been assumed, an average of the last five years.

The robust revenue collection reinforces hope of a good economic performance in the third quarter of financial year 2020-21 after the surprising pickup seen in Q2.