After the Commercial Tax Department, by interrogating the utility of the bureau, Minister of M.P. State, Mr Brijendra Singh Rathore has issued the ultimatum for the closure of the Anti-Evasion Bureau.
Anti-Evasion Bureau had almost collected 30 thousand crore rupees in the state’s treasury but after the introduction of GST regime from July 2017, the officers of the Anti-Evasion Bureau were sitting idle and also the Anti-Evasion bureau of all the divisions of the state including Bhopal, Gwalior, Indore has almost lost their roles.
Even after the introduction of the e-way bill process in April 2018, the officers did not take any action against the vehicles carrying goods while their wages & other facilities accounted for more than Rs one crore per month in the expenditure.
So, the Department Minister has ordered the officers to research the possibility of closing down the bureau.
He has also put forth the condition which states that if the staff in the bureau will be able to give adequate contribution in achieving the departmental target, till March 31, 2019, then it will be continued further, while in the contrast results, the bureau will be terminated.
After the ultimatum, the Bureau’s staff has initiated actions and are now engaged in performing their work well. New provisions have also been introduced in which the staff of all the divisional headquarters have been posted in other departments. Resulting in more than 50 cases of tax evasion through vehicles have been captured in Gwalior.
Role of Bureau:
The primary role of Anti-Evasion Bureau is to defend tax evasion. It acts like a Vigilance team. It keeps check-on vehicles including the payload, illegal products, proper tax payment, toll tax clearance, timings, etc. It is in the bureau’s jurisdiction to take strict action on merchants who evade tax.
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Avinash Lavania, Additional Commissioner, Commercial Tax Department stated that the process of moving staff from Anti Evasion Bureau to different departments has been initiated which is giving good response and capturing many tax evasion cases. While he does not have any idea of Bureau related recruitments.
If  the staff of Anti Evasion Bureau continues to contribute standard results in meeting up the targets of the department, then the idea of shutting the Bureau will be dropped off. In the absence of this, the bureau is being considered for closure.
