Audit Reports
Maharashtra
Report No. 4 of 2019 - Revenue Sector, Government of Maharashtra
Overview
This Report contains 19 paragraphs relating to non/short levy of taxes, duties, interest and penalty, etc., involving Rs 221.33 crore.
Audit on “Assessment of dealers - Builders/Developers under VAT Act” revealed that the Department has not conducted surveys to ensure registration of all the builders and developers. Audit noticed that there was lack of sharing of information between the GST Department and other departments and corporations. No effort was made to register the dealers either on collateral basis on the basis of cross verification of records was made with other departments like Inspector General of Registration, local bodies, Income Tax Department to bring the Builder and Developer dealers under tax net whose turnover had exceeded the threshold limit. The deductions like cost of land, standard deduction, stage-wise deduction, etc., were being allowed without proper verification.
Audit on “Preparedness for transition to Goods and Services Tax” revealed that though the Government/ Department was prompt in its preparedness for implementation of GST, frequent changes were made in the rules since 1 July 2017 on recommendations of GST Council by the State Government which have resulted in non-implementation of many of the procedures laid down in State GST Act. Return in form GSTR-2 and Refund Module were not made operational. The number of cases selected for assessments was increasing from year to year but the pace of their finalisation was very low, thus resulting in accumulation of arrears in assessments.
Audit on “Verification of loading restrictions of vehicles at Border Check Posts” revealed that there was huge difference (2,68,633) in the number of vehicles (carrying goods beyond the permissible gross laden weight) between the figures furnished by the Department and those furnished by the Maharashtra Border Check Posts Network Limited (through the Transport Commissioner). This resulted in non-recovery of compounding fees/fines of minimum of Rs 81 crore from overloaded vehicles carrying goods beyond permissible limit. There were delays ranging from seven to 19 months in issue of service fee notification, as a result of which the Border Check Posts remained idle till the date of notification.
Penalty for late filing of Audit Report in form 704 amounting to Rs 3.32 crore was not levied in 14 cases. There was short levy of stamp duty of Rs 5.20 crore on account of non-consideration of renewal clause extending the lease period for working out the market value in three lease deeds. In eight cases the unearned income in respect of sale of class-II land was recovered short by Rs 14.25 crore.