GST meet; Odisha to oppose dual control of small traders

State govt has pitched for a clear jurisdiction for scrutiny/risk based audit selection

The Odisha government will oppose dual control by both central and state authorities in case of dealers having annual transactions of less than Rs 1.5 crore.

The state will voice its opposition at the upcoming meet of the empowered committee of state finance ministers on GST (Goods & Service Tax) roll out on August 20 in New Delhi.

“We are of the view that in case of dealers having transactions less than Rs 1.5 crore annually, there should not be any duplication or dual control. Since the taxable event will be the same, both authorities having power on the same dealer for scrutiny and risk based audit will not be feasible,” said an officer of state commercial tax department.

The state government has pitched for a clear jurisdiction for scrutiny/risk based audit selection. Suitable provision in the State GST (SGST), Central GST (CGST) and Integrated GST (IGST) may be made to give effect to this administrative arrangement, it suggested.

On exempted list of goods under GST, the state government is of the view that this list should be reduced to the minimum.

Justifying the pruning of exemption list, the government has argued that since there is seamless integration of the input tax credit chain under GST, the need for exemption will be less. Besides, exemption should be granted only to goods of local importance.

The state has backed a common exemption list for both SGST and CGST and for all states.

It has supported the empowered committee’s views on fixing a threshold of Rs 25 lakh both for SGST and CGST for goods and services.

On the committee’s recommendations on IGST and GST on imports, the state government has opined that short payment of tax should not be allowed. If short payment is allowed, there will be problem in disallowing input tax credit (ITC) since there is no measure for apportionment of the short payment amount among the purchasing dealers. The return should be accepted only if tax shown as payable is paid by the dealer.

On standard invoice, the report of the empowered committee recommended that sales and purchase invoice details needs to be made mandatory for filing of e-returns. On this count, the state government said that a standard invoice needs to be designed and prescribed so that there should be no error for matching and pairing of invoice.

On dispute resolution mechanism, the state government feels the matter cannot be dealt separately by the Centre and the state. The matter should be dealt either by one government delegating the power to the other or by a committee consisting of tax authorities of both the governments.

The empowered committee had recommended that disputes relating to excess claims of SGST credit on inter-state purchases should be dealt by the state governments under SGST Act while default in payment of reversed ITC on CGST and SGST should be handled by the Government of India.