Service Tax - Team Negative List - For Heaven's Sake - Please Postpone the Scheme
TODAY is the last day that better sense can prevail and the new negative list regime with its solitary goal of harassing genuine taxpayers is deferred. There are rumours that Vodafone may get relief from the retrospective amendment of Income Tax Act, with Pranab Da out of the scene, but thousands of small time assessees of Service Tax are destined to face the cruel fate of an unclear law making their lives miserable. Lakhs of Gulf Indians are deeply worried that there would be a tax on their remittances to India. All the Gulf newspapers are full of stories on the plight of poor Indians in Gulf sending a little money to their poor relatives. Member of Parliament Shashi Tharoor has already written to the Prime Minister about this short-sighted measure, which would divert remittances to hawala channels and tempting otherwise law-abiding citizens to indulge in undesirable malpractices.
There is nobody to tell them that the Service Tax is not on the amount of remittance but on the fee charged by the agencies for money transfer. For example, if the fee is one percent of the amount to be transmitted, for 10,000 rupees, the fee would be Rs. 100/-. On this, the tax would be Rs. 12/-. But Tharoor says, it would be Rs. 1236/-.
There is nobody in the CBEC to explain these things. Board doesn't seem to have a PR wing or if it has one, it is shy of making its views known to the Public.
There is nothing positive about the negative list - everyone is confused; and that includes Departmental officers and the consulting fraternity; there is no clarity.
And the Government is going to lose Education Cess on Service Tax from 1st July. Is this mad rush necessary? Can't we set things right and then start or do we start in chaos and allow things to settle by themselves after years of litigation?
An irresponsible Government with an irresponsive attitude can cause irreparable damage. A few more hours of today are still left for the Government to have a look before the leap. Will they do it?