GST - One Nation - Two Departments and Three Taxes - GST Administration
THE "One Nation - One Tax" will actually be two Departments, the Central GST and IGST administered by CBEC and the State GST administered by the State VAT Departments.
How will these two departments administer the GST? The staff strength and hierarchy in these two departments are vastly different.
A comparison of the two departments in one of the States:
Central Excise and Service Tax | Commercial Taxes/VAT | ||
|---|---|---|---|
Designation | No. of officers | Designation | No. of officers |
Principal Chief Commissioner | 1 | 0 | |
Chief Commissioner | 0 | ||
Principal Commissioner | 2 | 0 | |
Commissioner | 10 | Commissioner | 1 |
Additional Commissioner/Joint Commissioner | 20 | Additional Commissioner | 2 |
Joint Commissioner | 4 | ||
Assistant Commissioner/Deputy Commissioner | 80 | Deputy Commissioner | 17 |
Assistant Commissioner | 33 | ||
Superintendent | 400 | Commercial Tax Officer | 134 |
Inspector | 600 | Deputy Commercial Tax Officer | 200 |
Total | 1113 | 391 | |
How will they realign the overstaffed Central Excise with the understaffed Commercial Taxes? Will 10 CGST Commissioners interact with 1 SGST Commissioner? And who will the Principal Chief Commissioner interact with?
It is not as if the Commercial Taxes Department with about a third of the strength of the Central Excise Department is collecting any less revenue.
The VAT revenue for 2014-15 was Rs. 23,000 crore while the Central Excise and Service Tax Revenue was less than half at about Rs.10,000 crore.
Dr. Ravindra Babu TDP MP suggested in the Lok Sabha that a new Central Service called the IRS (GST) should be created to administer the GST. Dr.Babu is a former IRS (Customs) officer.