Caught in crossfire of GSTIN fraud crackdown, FIRST India urges fair treatment

Mumbai, May 30 (Agency) The Forum for Internet Retailers, Sellers, and Traders (FIRST) India organised a roundtable discussion on Tuesday here, where participants demanded to establish a robust procedure that enables genuine entities to present their case and provide the necessary documentation, reducing the compliance burden they face, in view of challenges posed by ongoing nationwide initiative led by Central and State Tax administrations to detect and eliminate fraudulent Goods and Services Tax Identification Numbers (GSTINs).

In this roundtable discussion, Vinod Kumar, India SME Forum president and trustee and FIRST India, president, was quoted as saying in a press release, “Earlier access to finance was seen as the biggest hurdle for MSMEs (micro, small and medium enterprises), but now it is becoming GST-related complications.” Prahlad Kakar, chairman, India SME Forum (ISF), said, “The current threat of suspension / cancellation of GST is compelling small businesses to revert to a cash-based / multiple enterprises to stay under the GST limits. The government will be better off in looking at enterprises with turnovers higher than five crores to check evasion or fraudulent ITC claims.”