AAP ropes in citizens to tackle tax evaders

Reward for those who upload original bills

The AAP government is all set to rope in citizens to join in its ongoing offensive against tax evaders. This time there is a serious move to reward those who get their original bills uploaded on the government application. The winners could earn as much as '50,000 as prize money.

All one is required to do is to upload his or her bill and the same will be selected through a computerised lottery draw. For each purchase, the winner will be paid five times more than the original bill. And one per cent of those uploading the pictures of their bills will be getting a reward amount of double the amount of the bill through the lucky draw. That means one out of 100 people will be rewarded with double the amount mentioned in pictures of invoices that (s)he would upload on the app.

The VAT department will be launching an application on the scheme “Bill Banwao, Inaam Pao”, which can be downloaded on phone, to upload the pictures of bills provided by shop, restaurant, grocer, with basic details, such as the name of the establishment and the TIN mentioned in the bills. The app is likely to be launched by deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia on Monday.

A source said that the initiative will help the government in two ways — one the prize money and the lucky draw will encourage citizens to ask for proper invoices whenever they buy any product or avail of a service and secondly, with several invoices handy, the VAT department would be able to keep a check on specific establishments to ensure they do not manipulate the bills and subsequent they pay taxes to the government.

The bill/cash memo/retail invoice should contain the TIN of the selling dealers besides the full name of each item, rate of tax charged against each and total sale value excluding VAT. The bill is to be uploaded within seven days of the purchase to be eligible for the draw.

The app will also enable citizens to report fake or kachha bills — one of the most common ways adopted by several shops in the city to evade taxes — to the government, so that VAT inspectors can locate and crack down on the particular establishment. However, this one comes without a reward. The total minimum bill value acceptable would be '100 (excluding VAT and value of tax free /exempted goods). It should be purchased from registered dealers only and should have valid TIN. All the participating purchasers would have to retain original bill/cash memo/retail invoice in their custody till the prize amounts are credited to their bank accounts. Before releasing the prize amount to the winner, the department would get the concerned bills verified from the sales accounts of the selling dealers within days of the draw.

Bills given by restaurants have two components, the VAT which goes to the Delhi government and the service tax that goes to the central government, while those provided by shops mostly carry only the VAT.