Tax authorities have started tracking Radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags on commercial vehicles to detect Goods and Services Tax (GST) evasion and fraud by business owners.

The authorities are comparing electronic permits issued for transporting goods and RFID tags that commercial vehicles use to pass through toll plazas to identify mismatches.

By comparing details furnished at the time of generating e-way bills for goods movement with the actual movement of commercial vehicles at toll plazas, GST officials are trying to identify business owners who are evading GST. It may be noted that e-way bills are required for the transportation of goods more than Rs 50,000 by a GST-registered business or individual.

Officials have started comparing RFID data of commercial vehicles with submitted e-way bills after a racket was unearthed.

The Central Board of Direct Taxes and Customs (CBIC) told its field officers a couple of days ago that the racket involved unregistered firms transporting iron scraps under invoices of bogus and non-existing firms. Fake invoices were recovered by officials to the tune of Rs 14.5 crore, as per CBIC.

The authorities can compare e-way bills with RFID data after they were integrated in January this year. This helps authorities in verifying details of vehicle movement specified in the e-way bill with physical movement.

The integration has been hailed as a major milestone as it would help the government ramp up efforts to tackle and check tax evasion. The RFID tracking method will also enable authorities to narrow down on specific cases flagged in IT systems.

 

Source: India Today