ICAI to submit suggestions on GST law by Jan 5

Mangalore Today News Network

Mangaluru, Dec 3, 2016: Addressing media in Mangaluru, Madhukar Hiregange, chairman of Indirect Taxation Committee, ICAI, Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, on Dec 2,Friday said the institute will submit its suggestions on revised changes in Goods and Services Tax (GST) Law to the Union government by January 5.  He added that as the GST law is expected to be passed in the winter session of the parliament, the ICAI has been vetting the pros and cons recommending changes in provisions to the government. Sixty provisions were changed and 300 suggestions that offer solutions to problems were from chartered accountants alone, he said.

He said that this follows a talk with the government, following the latter’s invitation in May to prepare a training module for officers. Accordingly ’Model GST Law’, a 700-page document, has been prepared. Video lectures have been made available on the website of ICAI for online studies, besides YouTube that has already received an overwhelming response with many downloading the same.

Following a requisition from NACEN, National Academy of Customs Excise and Narcotics, a capacity building wing in indirect taxation, an apex institute of the government of India, a target has been set to provide 700 faculty by January to train the officers of customs excise and narcotics.

Hiregange said that to ensure quality tutors, applications have been invited from across the country and 1,500 people applied for the same. Among them, 400 were selected after a thorough evaluation process and were trained in a two-day coaching in nine locations across the country. The additional 200 will be selected in the later stages, he said.

He said chartered accountants are well prepared and ahead of all the government departments. An eight-day certified programme into the passing of law and a 10-day programme after the passage of law have been planned, as the institute has two lakh members, with majority of 1.5 lakh from industries alone.

He said total of 17 study groups have been already formed to analyse the model law and 19th study group will be from Mangaluru. The group is expected to analyse one portion of the law each before drafting its suggestions, that will be vetted by another group before recommending the suggestions to the government.

GST Month : Reacting to a query, Hiregange said that January will be observed as ’GST Month’ with a plan for at least 25 webcasts, each of duration four hours, to educate people.

One or two sessions will be broadcast on web in the ongoing month (including the two-day national conference on GST that was launched at Sri T V Raman Pai Convention Centre, Mangaluru on Friday). Moreover, keeping in mind the growing tribe of tech-savvy generation, conceptwise videos of 5 to 15-minute duration, with relevant changes, will also be produced and hosted on the website, he said.