As we traverse along the roads of Canacona taluka, one can spot many road-side businesses, ranging from cement products to natural stone shops that operate without valid permissions, thereby depriving the government of precious revenue, which otherwise would have been collected if these businesses were brought under GST bracket.
As per the GST regulations, which came into force since last year, it is mandatory for any business with an annual turnover of Rs 20 lakh to register under Goods and Services Tax (GST). However, with no checks in place, one can see hundreds of road-side and other business establishments in Canacona taluka which are functioning without GST registrations, causing losses in crores of Rupees to the government exchequer.
The shops and establishments in Canacona taluka range from cement products shops, plywood, tiles, water tanks to ready-made garments shops, most of which neither have GST registrations nor any other statutory registration from any regulatory bodies.
Locals allege that these shops are mostly run and managed by non-Goans, who don’t pay a single rupees in taxes, despite making turnover in crores.
A visit to a couple of cement products, natural stone dealers and ready-made garments shops revealed that they do not have any registrations and do turnovers to the tune of crores of Rupees. Interestingly many even collect all sorts of taxes from the customers for the items sold by refrain from paying any amount to the government, unlike local dealers who punctually pay all types of taxes to run their businesses.
Vice president of Association of Businessmen of Canacona (ABC) Anil Bhagat said it is high time the government took notice of these illegal businesses and crackdown on such activity.
ABC President Diogo Da’ Silva said he has been receiving a lot of complaints regularly from members of ABC of the malpractice and requested the authorities to conduct survey of such business establishments that carry out business activities without proper registrations.
ABC has over 150 shops registered under its banner.
When this correspondent spoke to officials of the Commercial Tax Office, Margao they said regular checks were conducted at various times and whoever comes under the criteria of the department is instructed to register.
