Punjab Traders' Board meeting on Sept 7: Basant

Basant says, traders of Punjab should put their problems openly before the Board

Ludhiana, September 1, 2021: Punjab Traders' Board Senior Vice Chairman (Excise and Taxation) Bhupinder Singh Basant has said that the board's meeting is being held in Punjab Bhawan, Chandigarh on September 7 in the presence of senior officers, in which many important issues related to the traders of the state will be discussed and appropriate decisions will be taken in this regard.

Giving this information in a statement issued here today, Basant further said that in the proposed meeting, the Board members, senior office-bearers and senior officers of the department would remain present. Among other issues, detailed discussions will be held on One Time Settlement (OTS) of pending VAT refunds. There is a long-pending demand by the traders to resolve this matter.

Basant informed that the assessment of VAT related cases has been done in the districts under the Excise and Tax Department and for their disposal by the Punjab Government, the maximum amount of One Time Settlement (OTS) has been fixed at a maximum of Rs.5 lakh. In the proposed meeting of the board, it is proposed to increase the limit of OTS and fix the date.

He also informed that whether the One Time Settlement (OTS) scheme can be implemented in the districts where VAT has not been assessed, will also be seriously discussed in the meeting. This is expected to benefit those traders who were out of the scheme till now.

Apart from this, the cases pending in the VAT Tribunal will also be discussed in detail.

Basant also said that many other problems and demands of the traders will also be discussed.

He said that the institutional tax will also be seriously discussed in the meeting. He said during the previous state government of the Akali-BJP combine, the scheme was introduced by the then Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal to levy institutional tax. But later the traders were asked not to deposit the tax, the notification of which was not issued.

Giving more information, Basant said that in the present state government, institutional tax is being charged from the traders who are working outside the limits of the municipal corporation, which is very less. The cold storages or shellers who are outside the limits of the municipal corporation are not paying tax because the condition of the traders’ community is very pathetic due to the pandemic. Therefore, it is proposed to discontinue this scheme.

He said that in the meeting, the matter of setting-up of advisory committees of the Excise and Taxation Department both at the state and district level may also be discussed. There has been a demand for the formation of these committees for a long time. The problems of the traders can be resolved by setting-up these committees at the local level.

Basant said that in the meeting of the board, many other issues will be seriously discussed in favour of the traders and decisions will be taken on them. Therefore, he strongly appealed to the traders of Punjab to put their problems openly before the Board so that after discussing them in detail, appropriate decisions can be taken.

He said that the Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh has constituted the board only to solve the problems of the traders so that they do not have to go anywhere elsewhere to solve these problems. He assured the traders that whatever decisions would be taken by the board would be for the betterment and benefit of the traders.

Basant said that he has already contacted many business organizations and got their feedback so that the related issues can be taken up in the board meeting. He said that this process of taking feedback from business organizations is still going on and any business organization is free to meet him and make him aware of the problems being faced by the traders.