The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Large Taxpayers Unit in Chennai

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Dec 07, 2007
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Large Taxpayers Unit in Chennai

N. Anand

A single window for large entities

38 corporate houses express willingness to be part of the unit
Units will be treated like a ‘client,’ and not as an assessee

CHENNAI: After Bangalore, it is the turn of Chennai to house Large Taxpayers Unit that will act as a single window facility for large entities paying excise duty, corporate tax/income tax and service tax.

The soft launch of the unit took place last week. It is housed near ‘Yes Yes Mahal’ at Anna Nagar.

Around 38 corporate houses have expressed their willingness to be part of the unit, which is being headed by Chief Commissioner of Central Excise Chennai Zone Jayendranath.

Electronic payment

As per the proposal, these units need not have to stand in line to pay the taxes, as it can be done electronically. Moreover, the units would be treated like a ‘client,’ and not as an assessee.

Their problems will be sorted out the same day or the same hour by officers in the rank of Deputy Commissioner or Additional Commissioner.

This will benefit large companies that have presence in multiple locations.

Stakeholder

Talking to The Hindu on Thursday, LTU Commissioner Madhu Mohan Damodhar said: “We have done away with the concept of virtual interface between the corporate houses and the assessing officers. Every single LTU will be treated as a stakeholder. We have moved out of the collection mode and have employed like-minded officers to carry out this task. At present, we have 100 people in this state-of-the-art building.”

Threshold

While the Bangalore unit has 48 clients, the Chennai unit may surpass the total tally within the shortest possible time, as another 5-6 firms have expressed their wish to join the elite group.

For instance, to be part of the Bangalore unit, a corporate house should be paying central excise and service tax of Rs. 1,000 crore a year, or income tax of Rs. 800 crore. For the Chennai unit, the threshold has been fixed at above Rs .7,000 crore for central excise and service tax and over Rs. 1,500 crore for income tax.

Paperless office

“Still we are in take-off stage. It will take at least a month or two to become fully functional. We expect the unit to garner taxes to the extent of Rs. 8,000 crore, as MRF is one of our biggest stake-holders. At the end of the day, we would like to make this unit a paperless office and provide reply or solutions immediately. Refunds will be made in 30 days,” Mr. Damodhar said.

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