New Delhi: A ministerial panel led by Bihar deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi on Saturday set a roadmap to resolve the glitches in the IT system supporting goods and service tax (GST) so that 80% of the problems faced by businesses will be rectified by October end.
Modi, who briefed reporters after the first meeting of the panel in Bengaluru, said officials from Infosys Ltd, which built the IT network for GSTN to process tax returns, will work on all problems identified in the system. GSTN is a company owned by Union and state governments and non-government financial institutions.
“Infosys has assured us that they will take care of all these things,” Modi said in a presser webcast by moneycontrol.com.
The five-member ministerial panel will meet every 15 days to oversee how technical problems are being resolved. Its next meeting in the first week of October is likely to be held in Bengaluru again.
The panel also urged taxpayers to file returns without waiting for the last date, a practice that mounts heavy traffic and stalls the system. “There is a general tendency among people to file returns on the last day, leading to a heavy rush,” said Modi.
The hassles taxpayers faced in uploading GST returns had led to several extensions of deadlines. With state ministers expressing disappointment over the IT system’s performance, the GST Council led by finance minister Arun Jaitley decided to set up the ministerial panel to oversee resolution of the glitches.
On 9 September, the GST Council extended the last date for filing GSTR 3B, a summary return of transactions for July, by four more months.
The other returns—GSTR1 relating to supplies made, GSTR2 elating to purchases and GSTR3, a comprehensive one for the month of July—have to be filed on 10 October, 31 October and 10 November, respectively.
The last date for filing GSTR 3B summary return for August—the second month of GST implementation—is 20 September, according to a calendar published by the government on Friday.
Sushil Modi said taxpayers should not wait till the last date for this either.
“About 47 lakh GSTR 3B returns were filed for the month of July, but only 3.05 lakh returns have so far been filed for August. Don’t wait for the last date,” said Modi.
Pratik Jain, partner and leader of indirect tax practice at PwC India, said the pace at which IT-related issues are being addressed is encouraging.
“Hopefully, the committee has got a comprehensive view of all the issues and challenges that industry is facing. It would be important to work within the time lines that have been agreed between the stake holders to resolve these issues,” said Jain.