Team Herald
PANJIM: The State government, in an attempt to recover pending dues from EDM organiser Percept, has moved a proposal to the Sports Authority of Goa (SAG) not to release payment against the bill produced for the opening ceremony of the Lusofonia Games, which was managed by a sister concern of Percept.
This move, by the Department of Commercial Taxes, comes in wherein the District Collector Mumbai failed to respond to correspondence from the North Goa Collector to attach the company’s properties in the neighbouring State for recovering the pending dues.
Speaking to Herald, Commercial Taxes Commissioner Dipak Bandekar said, “As the Sunburn EDM festival organiser does not have any property in Goa, the State government through the North Goa Collector has asked District Collector Mumbai to officially send a notice to Percept for the recovery of pending dues, which are yet to be paid by them but there was no response.”
He said, “We have now attached their money, as in SAG was supposed to pay a sister concern of Percept approximately Rs 3 crore as they had managed the opening ceremony of the Lusofonia Games. We, through Finance Department, have directed SAG to not release the payment to them but to credit the same to the government.”
He added that the department had also sent a fresh notice to Timeout72 music festival asking them to furnish details about the festival in terms of commercial activities. “The organisers have also failed to inform the department about the total sale of tickets during the three-day festival from December 27 to 29, 2017 at Vagator,” Bandekar had said earlier.
Earlier, faced with allegations on non-payment of dues to the government in connection with Sunburn, its organisers had claimed that the State owes them Rs 6 crore in the form of various refunds, including police bandobast charges.
