FM Arun Jaitley: Quarterly Filing of Returns Are Not Feasible Under GST

There are various provisions in the GST and their work-ability is only understood by the apex officials who have worked upon the tax regime and has tried every possible way to make it happen. Recently Union finance minister Arun Jaitley stated that the quarterly filing of the return is not feasible and can not work for the taxpayers who has a turnover of above Rs. 50 lakhs.

Arun Jaitley mentioned in a letter to All India Congress Committee general secretary Digvijaya Singh, “For all taxpayers, it is not workable to have quarterly return because input tax credit has to be given every month.” The quarterly filing provision has been kept for the under 50 lakh turnover business entities and has been kept in the composition scheme but the only lacking is nonavailability of input tax credit for the.

In return, the All India Congress Committee general secretary Digvijaya Singh asked a very important question regarding the file returns of a taxpayer. It was included in the letter that why there is submission of 37 forms in a year by a taxpayer under the GST scheme as there are only four returns and forms one in every quarter to be filed under the current regime, as he mentioned that this will take away the motive of easy operation so called by the government ahead of its presentation and also said that this will damage the ease of doing business operations.

Read Also: Basic Concept of GSP and ASP Along with Role in GSTN

General secretary Digvijaya Singh mentioned in the letter, “You (Jaitley) would agree that instead of reducing the number of returns you have increased it by nine times. Would it improve our global ranking in ease of doing business which your government has been promising.” In the return answers, Jaitley cleared that the taxpayer only needs to file an initial return on the 10th of every month and after which the other returns on the availability of input tax credit and invoice matching are automatically generated.

Union Finance minister Arun Jaitley said that “The model of invoice matching for eligibility of input tax credit of the recipient has been adopted in the GST design after much deliberation in the GST Council. One of the most important advantages of adopting this model is for curbing the possible tax evasion on account of fake invoice frauds.” While on the other side, GST expert Pritam Mahur said in an interview that, “Though inward returns and monthly returns will be auto-populated, still the taxpayer will have to validate these details before submission and add additional information like GST paid under reverse charge mechanism, details of credit notes etc.”

Trending Topic: Dealer Wise Process of GST Registration and Return Forms

There is also a vague obligation on the buyers to file returns in order to claim the input tax credit and this exercise will be creating a havoc for the small business units as the compliance is strict and the cost of maintaining in the manner of new tax regime will also hit them in an unprecedented way.