Promotion of Payments through Cards and Digital Means
GOVERNMENT wants to provide access to financial payment services to every citizen along with ability to conduct card/digital transactions and digitalize Government collections by equipping each collection point with a method to accept card/ digital payments. Government has issued detailed guidelines for this goal.
1. Department of Electronics & Information Technology shall formulate an action plan to ensure Government Departments/Organisations introduce appropriate acceptance infrastructure and facilitate collection of all revenue, fee, penalties etc., through card/ digital means beyond a specified threshold, through 'PayGov India' or other mechanisms.
2. Department of Electronics & Information Technology shall develop 'Pay Gov India' as a "single unified portal" across central, state governments and their public sector undertakings for collection purposes.
3. Department of Revenue shall take steps to remove double taxation, if any, on service tax currently paid on MDR by the acquiring bank and on interchange fee by the issuing bank.
4. Department of Revenue/Department of Economic Affairs/Department of Financial Services shall grant tax rebates/incentives or introduce mechanisms for cash back/lottery or any other measures to incentivise transactions through cards and digital means.
At present, the fee for filing appeals before CESTAT, is to be paid by Demand Draft in the name of Assistant Registrar payable at New Delhi. This is a very cumbersome process, even for the CESTAT to monitor the DDs and their validity periods. Why can't they allow online payment?