ARE WE REALLY RAPID & SWIFT ???

In the olden days there was no concept of holding seminars, conventions but regular monthly meetings were held to monitor every aspect of the revenue collections and its myriad functions. Mostly, it led to the dissemination of information. The senior officers of the Department commanded high respect, not only due to the positions they occupied but also as a person. But slowly, over the years, the same has eroded to such an extent that it is now only a show of respect and that too as a formality. 

In the last decade onwards, holding of the Annual Chief Commissioners conferences started, but no one has bothered to monitor what is the fate of the minutes of the earlier conference/s and their outcome, but the rituals are being continued.

 

This year too, but under a new name “Rajasva Gyan Sangam” and the same was presided over by the Hob’ble PM. The same was covered extensively by the print & visual media especially the speech delivered by the PM and the new slogan “RAPID” and “SWIFT”, which stands for Revenue, Accountability, Probity, Information & Digitisation and Single Window Interface for Trade, respectively. He urges the officers to turn the Gyan Sangam into a Karm Sangam so that the idea generated from the conference will lead to concrete action on the ground.

CESA-Mumbai represented to the Chairman and Members of the CBEC to impress upon them the ground reality faced by the field staff and urged them to be bold & brave like the current Chief Justice of India and raising these issues before the Hon’ble PM. The coverage by the print and visual media was mainly about the Hon’ble PM’s mission and speech on the road map. From Board officials, nothing is heard or visible from the print & visual media. TaxIndiaonline has ran a critique of the whole Sangam including both the CBDT and the CBEC in its ambit.  A part of the article of 17-June-2016 is reproduced below :-

In a meeting that was not open to the Press, the Prime Minister interacted with the tax officers. 15 (out of about 300 who attended) IRS officers of CBDT and CBEC (five of them Assistant Commissioners with less than five years of experience) made their suggestions to the PM.

PM knows - Revenue Comes on its own: The Prime Minister made a very significant observation - that 92% of the revenue just flows into the treasury from self assessment, advance tax, TDS etc., The 1.5 lakh strong army of tax officers raise just 8%.

THE IRS View - what they told the PM: If you put together 'THE' and 'IRS', what you get is 'THEIRS'. It is ultimately 'THEIRS'.

 

These are some of the suggestions/views the IRS officers told the PM.

1. Confused - what should be our priority - tax enforcement or taxpayer friendly attitude. We are confused; we are not sure whether tax enforcement is our priority or to be friendly with taxpayers. This is a dilemma that many young IRS officers face and which senior IRS officers refuse to clarify and so over a period of time, the department is full of senior officers who have this dilemma. A young IRS officer told me recently, "I can't understand this tamasha of assessee friendly gesticulations - after all my job is to collect tax from him and he will not like my actions - there is no scope for friendship with him.". A working Chairman of the Board said in one of our meetings, "at the end of the day we are revenue collectors - and that is what matters to us." Recently a young IRS officer asked this question to a senior Judge who told him, "the taxpayer is your master and you are his servant; it is the taxpayer (citizen) who has appointed you and your boss Narendra Modi. It is he who gave you the power to enforce taxes. You should not treat him like a friend; you should treat him like your master. Your Commissioner, your Chairman, Your Finance Minister and your Prime Minister - they are all - all subordinate to him."

2. Tax Facilitation Act: There should be a Tax Facilitation Act written in simple language in all the regional languages, which can be understood by the common man. The Act should specify the norms and policies for collecting any tax from the citizens. There should be a stipulation that any law (notification) will be explained in local simple language.

3. Physical infrastructure in offices should be improved: Augment the resources and tools of the tax officers so that they can be better equipped.

4. Make e-governance internally too: We have e-filing, e-payment etc for the assessees, but still most of the internal communication within the tax offices is still on paper. E-communication within various offices should be enforced.

 

These observations by TIOL were not countered by either of the Boards or its senior officers. If this is the reality in the eyes of the media, then who will respect them as officers of the law and as law enforcers.

CESA-Mumbai has boldly raised the issues pertaining to their staff and career prospects, with the Members and Chairperson of the CBEC Board, but the great opportunity was not utilized by them. They may not have any say in the matter or have chosen to be more courteous and polite in the Sangam except for nodding their heads and agreeing to whatever is said. In reality we know our speed and our difficulties, we know our accountability as well as responsibility, and awareness and the lukewarm responses to queries raised on the helpdesk, so less said the better about digitisation. Keeping Apple computers on their desktops or travelling in the latest model of a vehicle, will not enable to meet the difficulties faced by the Trade as well as the Staff.

About the SWIFT, the implementation was done in Customs whereas the revenue in Service Tax has increased manifold, but their automations are not taken care of. Excuses may be many but we should not wait for the PM or the FM to come and point out the areas which needs to be worked on. It would be better if initiatives are taken on our own before they are pointed out by someone else.

About the simplifications, Service Tax will be one great beneficiary if this is done. In the beginning, it was envisaged that it would be a simple tax like VAT, but now it has become so complicated, like the erstwhile Tariff Item 68. It has also led to increased quantum of litigations where the majority of the staff is engaged in non-productive work and the observation of the Judiciary about the constitutional validity has demoralized them further. The staff is not happy, both on the infrastructure side and on their career progression side. Humiliation from all sides, whether it is from their senior officers, judiciary or the trade, has increased their stress levels to such an extent that it has started seriously affecting their health. The workforce of the CBEC is only second to the Railways but the encouragement, incentives and protections are simply not visible, which discourage a lot.

Seminars and Sangams will go on but our Board officials should learn to carry their staff alongwith them as per the needs and demands of the time. Lest they become mere bystanders at their own seminars and sangams.

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