OUR MISSION

This is the captain of stvat.com welcoming you aboard stvat.com. It is our cherished desire to be your official carrier to transship you from your safe terrain of single point levy to the uncharted terrain of a VAT regime by April 2002. The journey will be turbulent with lot of air pockets like resistance of traders, difficulties in drafting an appropriate VAT Act etc. The landing is not expected to be very smooth. We, at stvat.com, have started on this journey with a mission to mobilise public opinion to help the tax administrators design a practical VAT and to make the transition smooth.

We, once again Welcome you to your own mini portal on Sales Tax VAT. Yes, we choose to call this your portal because the success of establishing this portal depends on the participation by all those who will be affected by the replacement of the present system of levy of tax by VAT. This portal has been designed as a comprehensive source of information on VAT initiatives in all the States in India. The portal will highlight VAT information relevant to traders, manufacturers, exporters, consumers and tax administrators.

TOWARDS PRACTICAL VAT

There are mixed opinions on the replacement of the present system of levy of Sales Tax by VAT. Traders oppose VAT as it will impose additional responsibilities in terms of account keeping and departmental inspection/verification. Manufacturers welcome VAT as it would be advantageous. Irrespective of the conflicting views, it is a fact that VAT will replace the present system of taxation. So, we believe that it is the combined responsibility of all those who have a role either as a consumer, tax administrator, tax professional or a manufacturer or trader, to play a constructive role in designing a practical VAT.

HELP US TO KEEP THE SITE UPTO DATE

The D-day for introduction of VAT has been set as April 1, 2002. The moot question is, are all States ready for the D-day? From the information available on the net, it appears that only Karnataka, Maharastra, Madhya Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh are at a higher level of preparedness. Tamil Nadu have just recently setup a VAT CELL. We do not have information on the progress in other States. We request tax administrators, trade bodies, tax professionals and any one else interested to kindly give us inputs on the progress in various States to keep our site upto date, after all it is your own web site.

We have designed the site to include all relevant information. Stvat.com will accommodate the views of all those who have a role in designing an appropriate system of VAT and encourage healthy discussion. We seek your active participation to reach our common goal.

CALLING TAX PROFESSIONALS

We request tax professionals in various States capitals to participate in our mission and be our honorary correspondents to keep the site upto date with latest developments. Please contribute articles on VAT. All contributions will be gratefully acknowledged.

SITE CONTENT

We plan to provide information on various issues like the minimum threshold limit, list of goods that need to be exempt from VAT, is VAT inflationary, input credit for capital goods, etc…

EDITOR

Sri S. Sridharan, Chartered Accountant with over 20 years experience in both direct and indirect taxes has agreed to be the honorary editor and will be writing a weekly column on various aspects of VAT. S.Sridharan has presented papers on taxation in several seminars and is a consultant to several trade bodies.

REQUEST TO TAX ADMINISTRATORS

We request Commercial Taxes departments of various States to kindly send us copies of press releases, discussion papers, draft VAT Acts, Rules and Forms, publicity brochures etc. to help us keep the site upto date. We are sure that participation in this portal will help tax administators in understanding the perception of the trade, industry and the consumer and will help in designing an appropriate VAT. We have planned to present the views of the netizens, the discussion forum and the results of the opinion poll ,Statewise.

REQUEST TO TRADE BODIES

We request trade bodies, professional associations to communicate us their opinion and details of Vat related conferences/seminars. Please also send us copies of the papers presented at the seminars. We shall publish the papers or the extracts that are relevant. We also request you to inform your members of the of this portal for wider participation .

UNIFORM SALES TAX FLOOR RATES

We have provided information on the Uniform Sales Tax Floor Rates and as to how it compares with the present rate of tax in Tamil Nadu. We plan to provide the comparative statement for other States as well, in due course. We request the help of tax professionals in different States to help us with necessary data.

OUR INITIAL SPONSORS

M/s. Sriviven Software, publishers of Sales Tax Referencer Software are the initial sponsors of this mini portal and have made available a free download of their Uniform Sales Tax Floor Rates software . This software is with reference to Tamil Nadu.

LET US REACH OUR GOAL

We, at stvat.com, have taken the first step to launch the site and it is your responsibility to keep the site upto date so that all of us can contribute to reach the goal of achieving a PRACTICAL VAT. Please participate actively.

23/09/2001

(just to understand the context in which this website was launched the details in this page has not been updated.)