Drought hits revenue collections hard

HYDERABAD: The severe drought in the state has not just hit the farming community, but has also had an impact on revenue collections.
In addition, the ensuing elections have also come in the way of the tough stance the commercial taxes department sometimes adopt on revenue collection.
The department,which had been given a target of collecting Rs 9,700 crore from sales tax in 2003-2004, is likely to fall short by nearly Rs 1,000 crore.
The department''s revenue collection stands at Rs 7,156 crore till January 2004, as against the target of Rs 7,738 crore.
With the tax collection department envisaging turbulent times in netting the projected revenue receipts, it has reportedly revised the target to Rs 9,115 crore.
The state exchequer mopped up Rs 8,337 crore in 2002-2003, an increase of 9.38 per cent over the previous year.
The drought conditions severely affected the purchasing power of people, thus hitting the revenue collection, a commercial taxes department official said.
The Rural Development Cess RDC) collected from paddy procurement at Food Corporation of India (FCI) godowns witnessed a fall of 60.78 per cent over the previous year.
Although this does not have a major say on the tax collection figures, it reflects the impact of drought on people''s purchasing capacity, he added.
With the likelihood of the coffers receiving lesser than what was envisaged, the department is focusing on collection of arrears and to plug the revenue losses from various sources.
Targets are being fixed at each Commercial Tax Officer (CTO) and Deputy Commissioner level and focus was laid on surprise checks and inspections, the official said.
However, the saving grace for the department is the favourable tidings in the collection of taxes under various other heads like profession tax, entertainment tax and betting tax.
Revenue receipts of the luxury tax are the only one to be hit with the ban on sale of gutkha in the state.