New technology to help detect tax evasion

CHENNAI: Minister for Commercial Taxes and Registration S Gokula Indira, on Thursday, handed over GSM-enabled hand-held devices to officials of the Enforcement Wing of the Commercial Taxes Department to check evasion of taxes during transportation of goods.With  these devices, the officials would be able to check the veracity of the documents like the TIN of the consignor and consignee, the authenticity of the place of business and the returns filed by the traders.The devices that have modules to verify TIN, CST and status of returns would access information from the Central database to cross-check the authenticity of the claim of the traders while goods are in transit. The move would help officials augment revenue to the State besides avoiding hassles to the traders.In the first phase, 35 gizmos are being distributed at a cost of Rs 9.25 lakh to the Enforcement Wing officials of Chennai and Coimbatore divisions.