Punjab CM asks officials for optimum recovery of VAT from Govt works

Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal Wednesday called for an inbuilt mechanism for realization of optimum recovery of tax deduction at source on the contract works in the state. 

Presiding over a high level meeting of the senior functionaries of the state government, .Badal directed the Excise & Taxation department to plug all the loopholes in the tax recovery system to ensure strict compliance of VAT on the work contracts allotted by the various departments of the government.   He also asked the all the departments to appoint a nodal officer to work in tandem with the Excise & Taxation Department to achieve the desired results. 

Badal agreed to the proposal of Excise & Taxation department in principle and directed the departments to only enlist those contractors who had TIN (Tax Identification Number) so that they could be tracked down by the department for the recovery of tax.  

Likewise, the Chief Minister also asked the Drawing & Disbursing Officers (DDOs) to have TDN (Tax Deduction Number) for the proper compliance of tax realization in the VAT regime.   He said that both TIN and TDN would help the enforcement wing of the Excise & Taxation Department to zeroing in the defaulting tax payers which would ultimately help the department to improve its tax recovery system enormously.   He hoped with these steps would result in moping up an additional revenue of Rs.500 to Rs.700 crore annually. 

Taking part in the deliberations, Financial Commissioner Taxation SS Brar informed the members that form No.25, 26 & 27 was mandatory for all the departments to be submitted to ensure strict compliance of VAT as per the provisions of the law for realizing tax recovery on account of works contract.  

Meanwhile, the Chief Secretary RI Singh asked the Financial Commissioner Taxation to circulate the broad outlines of the procedure to be adopted for the realization of VAT on account of work contracts from the government departments.   He said that it would help the departments to understand the nitigrity of the system in an efficient and result oriented manner. 

Prominent amongst others who were present in the meeting included Principal Secretary to Chief Minister DS Guru, Principal Secretary Finance DS Kalha, Secretary Irrigation & Power Suresh Kumar besides Administrative Secretaries and heads of the departments.