CBEC should develop strategic plan to 'best in class': Panel

A Finance Ministry panel has suggested that Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) should develop a vision and strategic plan to ensure its place among "best in class" customs administration.
"The strategy should reflect the changing role of customs beyond exclusive revenue orientation and focus on capacity building in emerging areas of importance," said the 2nd report of Tax Administration Reforms Commission (TARC).
The strategy, it said must enhance customer focus and proactively promote voluntary compliance and should include measures like customer guidance in the form of self-assessment check-lists, manuals containing standard operating procedures and fully updated, user friendly and reliable website.

The report said the CBEC should immediately commence work on the development of a customs vision and strategic plan, setting out the strategic goals and the implementation strategy to "ensure its place among 'Best in Class' Customs Administrations".
The Finance Ministry report addresses two important aspects of tax administration -- capacity building of customs department and data and information exchange.
In its first report, TARC had was on issues related to customer focus, structure and governance, people's function, dispute management and key internal processes and ICT.

The steady growth of international trade leading higher volumes and the emerging trends such as increase in regional trading arrangements, e-commerce and changing supply chain dynamics are adding to the challenges faced by customs.

"To face this challenge, Indian customs would need to move away from their traditional administrative approach towards a more proactive and wholesome compliance management approach," the report said.
It said they would need to transform their governance, change their control paradigm and become a highly technology driven organisation with a robust and reliable risk management based approach to governance.
The panel, headed by Parthasarathi Shome further said the CBEC should aim at developing systems, structures and processes that ensure a consistent and uniform response across the organisation whether in the area of customer services or enforcement.
The strategy, it added should reflect the changing role of customs beyond exclusive revenue orientation and focus on capacity building in emerging areas of importance.