Lucknow. Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has said that there will be no increase in the rate of VAT on petrol and diesel in Uttar Pradesh. He said that keeping in view the larger public interest, we have not increased the rate of VAT or imposed any new tax in the state. Uttar Pradesh has the lowest VAT rate on petrol and diesel. There will be no increase in VAT in the near future also.
Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath was reviewing the latest status of revenue collection in the state along with the officials of the state tax department at his official residence on Friday. The Chief Minister took one turn from all the zonal commissioners to inquire about the registration status of traders in GST in the zones under their charge, GST and VAT collection, efforts being made to check tax evasion and gave directions for increasing revenue collection.
He said that the total revenue collection of the state was Rs 58,700 crore in the financial year 2017-18, which has increased to about Rs one lakh crore in 2021-22. In the first quarter of the current financial year, a collection of Rs 32,386 crore has been made against the target of Rs 31,786 crore.
He asked for concerted efforts to achieve revenue in line with the GST and VAT collection target of Rs 1.5 lakh crore in the current financial year. He also instructed to make maximum use of Artificial Intelligence technology for revenue collection.
CM Yogi Adityanath stressed on gathering solid information by conducting necessary investigations before raids to stop the evasion of SGST. For this, there is a need to improve intelligence and increase the activeness of mobile parties.
He said that to increase the revenue collection, weekly targets should be given to the field officers from the government level and weekly review should be done. In which zone, how much raids were conducted, how much revenue was collected, reports should be prepared for all.
CM Yogi said that he himself would conduct a monthly meeting and review the revenue collection zone wise. It also directed that work should be done to take the present number of registered traders in GST from 26 lakhs to 30 lakhs. He directed to organize seminars in small towns to sensitize the traders and make them aware about the benefits of GST registration/return filing.
Adopt best practices in other zones: Yogi said that in revenue collection, zones like Agra, Bareilly, Gorakhpur, Ayodhya etc. have made commendable efforts to achieve the target. Follow their best practice to other zones as well. Many big projects of industrial development are going on in areas like Jhansi, Prayagraj, Lucknow, Kanpur, Ghaziabad. There is a lot of potential for tax collection here.