The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : Sales Tax (Amendment) Bill passed

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Friday, Dec 17, 2004

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Sales Tax (Amendment) Bill passed

By Our Staff Reporter

HYDERABAD, DEC. 16. The Assembly on Thursday evening passed the Andhra Pradesh General Sales Tax (Amendment) Bill, after a brief discussion.

Explaining the salient features of the Bill, the Minister for Commercial Taxes, Konathala Ramakrishna, said they included raising the self-assessment, turnover limit for traders from Rs. 20 lakhs to Rs. 40 lakhs, increasing the time limit from 60 to 90 days, an opportunity for traders to explain delays in filing returns and a uniform penalty provision of 12 per cent per annual.

Benefit for traders

The Minister said the amendments were proposed to reduce harassment of traders by officials and motivate traders to voluntarily pay taxes. The increase in self-assessment limit to Rs. 40 lakhs would benefit about three-lakh traders, he said, adding that the existing provisions were contributing to increase in tax evasion.

Participating in the discussion, Kala Venkat Rao (TDP), Nomula Narasimhaiah (CPI-M) and G. Demudu (CPI) wanted the Minister to explain clearly if the harassment levels of traders by officials would come down and by how much? Mr. Rao suggested that the uniform penalty of 12 per cent should be introduced with retrospect effect.

Networking

Mr. Ramakrishna said soon all Commercial Tax Offices would be networked and that traders could download the related forms, get doubts clarified and pay their taxes, all online. The purpose was to reduce unnecessary interaction between officials and traders, he said.

Until November-end, the collections of the department had registered a 19.9 per cent growth with earnings of Rs. 1,100 crores, he said.

The Assembly on Thursday evening passed the Andhra Pradesh Language Pandits Grade II (Regulation of Scale of Pay), Bill.

The Bill seeks to withdraw Grade I scale facilities for Grade II Language Pandits with the qualification required for the former, taking back G.O. No. 330 dated August 10, 1983.

Payment of arrears

Implementation of the G.O now would mean a financial commitment of Rs. 394 crores towards payment of arrears for 56,750 Grade II Language Pandits and a recurring expense of Rs. 63 crores every year, the Minister for School Education, N. Rajyalakshmi, told the House.

While Chada Venkat Reddy (CPI) sought a re-examination of the Bill saying there was a lot of confusion, Nomula Narasimhaiah (CPI-M) termed it a black law for Language Pandits. Gade Venkata Reddy (Congress) and Kommireddy Ramulu (Janata Party) supported the Bill.

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