Traders get last chance to join GSTN

Traders don’t need to panic if they have not yet plugged in to the goods and services tax (GST) portal. The government has decided to give them one last window to join the new tax regime. It will be opened before July 1, the rollout date for GST, to accommodate nearly 20 lakh businesses, which have not yet enrolled with the goods and services tax network (GSTN).

GSTN is the private entity tasked with providing network support in the new indirect tax regime.

The Centre and states together hold 49 per cent in the company with the remaining stake held by non-government financial institutions like HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank and LIC Housing Finance Ltd (LICHFL).

Out of about 80 lakh registered VAT, service tax and central excise assesses, only 60.5 lakh assesses have registered themselves on the unified IT infrastructure created by the GSTN.

A large number of traders and dealers have remained out of GSTN even its deadline has been extended twice.

“Later on, we plan to give another opportunity for enrolment. There will be a small window nearer to July 1,” GSTN chairman Navin Kumar told Financial Chronicle.

“Since the threshold for registering for GST has been raised to Rs 20 lakh (annual turnover), all the remaining businesses may not need to enrol for the new tax regime,” he added.

While big corporates are GST-ready, medium, small and micro enterprises (MSMEs) continue to lag behind. They have urged the government to extend the GST implementation date by two months to September 1, citing challenges in adopting digital technology.

The Confederation of All India Traders (Cait), a traders’ body, recently wrote to finance minister Arun Jaitley for deferring the GST rollout and suggested a nationwide awareness campaign for the benefit of small businesses.

“Whenever GST is implemented it should be fool-proof. It is a complete change from the existing system and driven entirely by technology. It is much different from the current tax regime. This is why we have been saying that the trading community should be educated properly before implementing the new tax system,” Cait secretary general Praveen Khandelwal said.

Meanwhile, the IT preparedness for the GST is well on track, with most states being in advanced stage of putting in place, their back-end systems.

As many as 27 states and union territories have been given the task of creating the back-end infrastructure to GSTN and sources said the company has almost readied them for integration with the integrated network.

In order to address the issue of internet connectivity in remote areas, GSTN has also developed a mobile app for filing tax returns and claiming input tax credit (ITC). “We have also developed an offline tool to help MS&ME sector. This can be downloaded on their system and can be used for uploading invoices,” GSTN chairman Navin Kumar said.

nirbhaykumar@mydigitalfc.com