GST Audit: CAG Ready to Implement on Digital Audit Plan for Companies

The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) is working to finalize an ‘End to End IT Solution‘ to review the Goods and Services Tax (GST). The proposition visualizes an experimental program on the GST review, which will be prepared by October this year. CAG has stated that after two initial versions a near real-time peer review along with digital audit will be reported by March 2019.

The CAG of India Mr. Shashi Kant Sharma disclosed that with GST turning into a reality, they too are in a position for digital audit in one working financial year. “Our idea is to create a data-driven platform for auditing the GST which is independent of time, place and person. Our State Auditor Generals are already interacting with state governments with requirements for the digital GST audit,” he said. Sharma will be in Bangalore next month to inaugurate the nodal center of the CAG for the GST auditing process.

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The GST digital audit, as indicated by CAG authorities, will make numerous firsts. It is aiming to leave a zero-paper trail and go paperless from the very first moment with key elements of the platform. The whole stage for this is being carefully documented for digitally-filed audit and real-time monitoring.

An information distribution center will be made by a security-cleared CAG group with information being gathered from sources, for example, the GST Network, the Central Board of Excise and Customs and commercial taxes departments of all states and UTs. Data will likewise be gathered by the CAG from the third parties as well like – the Income Tax office, urban municipalities and corporations, web based business, Airport Authority of India, Medical Council of India, agricultural marketing advisory groups and other administrative bodies.

As indicated by the CAG proposition, data relating to audit to review perceptions brought up in field assessment reports and, accordingly, draft paras arranged by GST review officers will likewise be stored in the data warehouse and will be available to all the stakeholders after security clearance.

The CAG proposes to utilize Aadhaar-based OTP and fingerprint authentication for passage into the portal by any client, entry by officers of the Indian Audit and Accounts Department (IAAD) working on the GST audit as well as for digital signatures of documents.

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Senior GST authorities said beta renditions of the GST digital audit will intend to set up a Comprehensive Audit Management Platform and also a Knowledge Management System and that the final digital audit will see the utilization of a mobile audit application, a real-time peer review and a risk-based Quality Assurance.