Jammu: A delegation of Traders Federation Warehouse Nehru Market led by its president Deepak Gupta met Commissioner, State Taxes, Jammu, Rashmi Singh in her office on Monday.
The purpose of the meeting was to discuss the problems faced by traders of Jammu.
During the meeting, Gupta submitted a memorandum highlighting various problems and demands of the trading community.
In the memorandum, the federation demanded that there should be only one check post after Lakhanpur to check goods transporting from Jammu to Kashmir.
“Apart from this, there should be no check post or naka in Jammu,” he demanded.
Gupta said that the GST department needed to understand the geographical conditions of Jammu and Kashmir.
“Jammu and Kashmir is not like Mumbai-Delhi. Sometimes it takes a whole week to cover the distance of 300 kilometers from Jammu to Srinagar. The roads remain closed for several days. We generate e-way bills from here but vehicles get stuck on the way. Many times, we are unable to contact drivers and the e-way bill expires. Sometimes the vehicle breaks down on the way. Goods have to be shifted in another vehicle. If the e-way bill expires, we are heavily fined. If the vehicle number changes, we are fined. Instead of finding such minor technical flaws, the department should see whether GST has been paid on the goods being transported,” he said.
Gupta said that the department should see that there was no tax evasion, but instead of checking tax evasion, the department was imposing a fine upon traders for minor technical mistakes, which was not right.
Demanding raising the limit of e-way bill, he said that the e-way bill limit should be increased from Rs 50,000 to Rs 2 lakh.
“Six years ago, this limit was kept at Rs 50,000 and in these six years inflation increased manifold and the prices of food items almost doubled. In such a situation, the e-way bill limit should also be enhanced to Rs 2 lakhs,” Gupta said.
Demanding the release of FDs of the VAT regime, he said that the department should immediately release the FDs of traders without any paperwork as the VAT period was already matured.
Gupta said that the trader community was not aware about the GST rules and there was a need to create awareness among them.
He said that there was a need to train the users of the online system of the department.
Commissioner, State Taxes, Jammu, Rashmi Singh appreciated the suggestions given by Gupta and said that all steps would be taken to create awareness and requested support and cooperation of the traders.
Traders Federation Ware House Nehru Market senior vice president Munish Gupta, vice president Abhimanyu Gupta, cashier Amit Gupta and Retailers Federation president Yashpal Gupta were also present during the meeting.
