State government has revised the target of entertainment tax after the revenue department expressed its inability to meet the set goal. Subsequently, the target of Nagpur district has come down from Rs 33 crore to Rs 20 crore.
Sources said that this year (2010-2011) the state government had set a target of over Rs 63.53 crore for six districts of Nagpur division. Last year the target for the six districts was Rs 17.40 crore. A senior officer with the divisional commissionerate, requesting anonymity, said that the state was losing crores in revenue every year owing to under-reporting of connections by cable operators. He admitted though that it would be tough to attain the new target, as it had been more than tripled.
The official said more than half of the total collection was expected from Nagpur district alone which has was given asked to collect Rs 33.30 crore. Following review of collection figures, the state government has recently revised the target. However, the officials at entertainment tax departments in divisional commissionerate and collectorate were not happy with even the revised target.
According to them, the government did not follow its own norms while revising the target. In its GR the government had stated that it would fix the tax target between 15 and 20 % of the last financial year's collection. Accordingly, the target of Nagpur district should have been set at Rs 13 crore. Senior officials said the government had favoured Pune and Mumbai while revising the target.
For instance, in 2009-2010 Pune district had achieved Rs 86.40 crore. As per the state government's revised target, the Pune district should have been been asked to raise more than Rs 100 crore but it was given a target of Rs 72 crore.
Arrest warrants: The entertainment tax department has issued arrest warrants against 14 cable operators for not paying outstanding entertainment tax dues. A senior officer from district entertainment tax department said that the outstanding dues of these operators are around Rs 14 lakh.
Similarly, the district collector office has also issued directives to the city police to cancel licences of seven hotels in the corporation playing orchestras if they failed to pay entertainment tax before March end. In August last year, the state government had imposed entertainment tax on hotels featuring live orchestras. As per the GR, such hotels in corporation limits should pay Rs 50,000 per month as entertainment tax while those outside city limit it was Rs 25,000 a month. Of the 10 hotels in city and outside city limits having live music shows, only three paid the taxes regularly, a senior officer in the collectorate claimed.
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