Dear
friends,
" Yenna kodumai ithu Saravanan".
You may be aware of
this famous punch dialogue of blockbuster Chandramukhi of yester years. When I read that a new Draft GST Law is put
in circulation by the Government in the month of May 2016, i.e in the month of
my retirement, the aforesaid dialogue started lingering in my ears. The reasons are not far to seek.
Ever since I joined the Central Excise Department, i.e., on 1st January 1981, my superiors
and the learned pundits of Regional Training Institute ( my reverential
respects to Shri W.S. Krishnan, the then Collector of Central Excise, Chennai ) who taught me the abc of Central
Excise, started drilling into my head that
the most important concept for the levy
of Excise duty is ‘ manufacture ’. Thus
started my journey in Central Excise and there was no looking back until my
retirement. This concept also played an important role in later years when new (baby
) levy – Service Tax was born into the indirect tax family. During this period of nearly 36 years, I have
read hundreds of hairsplitting interpretational judgments delivered by Hon’ble
Tribunals, High Courts and Supreme Court from time to time dissecting the
concept of ‘manufacture’ threadbare.
Now imagine my plight. I am almost touching the winning post
– i.e. point of my retirement. When I was about to finish my innings in the
Department successfully, all my learned
gurus of the Department and the learned judges of the various Courts turned
back and said in unison ‘ All your learned so far about the indirect
tax levy in India is wrong; the basic concept of ‘manufacture’ is gone! ; no
longer it is valid; high time you started unlearning that concept
and you catch up with new concept of ‘ supply of goods and/or services ‘
for the levy of indirect Taxes.
Now, whom should appeal crying ‘ this is unfair! Very unfair! You cannot do this to this child who was
reared and nourished all these years
with the nutritious diet of ‘manufacture concept ‘.
Nevertheless, I turn to my Lord Krishna who has never failed,
nor will do in future, for an answer.
He, with his enigmatic smile, tells me “Listen . There are three things
unavoidable in this world. They are 1.
Death; 2 Taxes and 3 changes”. Nothing
is permanent in this world. I have given
the wisdom to know this fundamental truth.
Then why wail and cry foul. There
is nothing that you cannot learn. Try
the new law also.
Thus, mustering courage from gospel, I took upon myself the
task of learning the new law. All these 4
months ( in Nov 2016 Revised GST was put in circulation ) I read the new law
and out of whatever was gathered as knowledge, I have successfully conducted 4
seminars also in February 2017 in which more than 500 members participated shooting volley of arrows of doubts towards
me showing lot of interest. That was a
memorable experience. I feel it is time for me to share such knowledge in this
forum also for the benefit of all.
Now, in the succeeding posts, I intend to pour my knowledge
of GST in layman’s language distinguishing it with Central Excise and Service
Tax. Members are welcome to participate
and to chip in their doubts ( no matter
who silly or small it may be ) which
would open the new window of knowledge not only to you but also to others and
me too!
I take leave of you for the time being…… Venkatesan
