Govt. mulls rating firms on GST compliance

GST officials are cracking down on fake invoicing and other tax evasion techniques. File.
| Photo Credit: PTI

The government is mulling the introduction of tax compliance ratings for vendors under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime and a pilot project is on the anvil to try out biometric authentications for applicants to be able to register with the GST framework. 

While GST officials are cracking down on fake invoicing and other tax evasion techniques, they have also found more than 11,000 firms that were considered ‘fake registrations’, some of which were undertaken through identity theft. 

Shashank Priya, member (GST) in the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) said a pilot was in the works for biometric authentication of Aadhaar of high-risk applicants with OTP verification on e-mail and mobile number linked to PAN. 

The risk score for applicants would be determined on the basis of detailed parameters and sophisticated data analytics which would be further made robust by using Artificial intelligence and Machine Learning” he said at a meeting hosted by Assocham to mark six years of GST.   

GST Network CEO Manish Kumar Sinha, said there was a move towards vendor ratings which may include providing all relevant data points to the industry which was largely compliant. “The GST law has a section dedicated to compliance rating and this will in one form or the other come into play,” he said.