BENGALURU: Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Tuesday held a series of meetings with various departments, including commercial taxes, excise, stamps and registration, and reviewed their revenue collection.He warned officials that they should meet the tax collection targets, otherwise action will be taken against them.
Siddaramaiah, who first met commercial tax department officials early on Tuesday, told them that he will consider their tax collection as the criterion for their transfers.
He told them to dispose of appeal cases within three months and any delay will attract action against them. He told them that to dispose of a large number of appeals coming in, the government has created an additional joint commissioner’s post who will start working from July 1. The chief minister told them that he will hold another review meeting in September and they should meet their revenue targets by then.
Speaking to officials from the stamps and registration department, he told them too to meet the target. The revision of guidance value and reforms in administration are expected to generate more taxes. In 2023-24, Rs 20,287 crore was collected as against a target of Rs 20,000 crore. The CM directed officials to prevent tax leaks by using GIS-based details of properties and their guidance value. He also directed them to increase citizen-centric services at sub-registrar offices.
At the meeting with mines and geology department officials, he told them to take up auctioning of mining sites which is due. He directed them to increase their revenue collection and to work along with forest department officials. He advised them to use drone survey and AI technology to prevent tax leak.
Stop smuggling of liquor: CM to officials
CM Siddaramaiah instructed Excise Department officials to prevent smuggling of liquor from neighbouring states into Karnataka. At a review meeting, the CM also instructed the officials not to harass liquor license holders during licence renewal. The CM also directed the depart-ment officials to meet and exceed the the tax collection target. The officials, howe-ver, informed the CM that they could not touch the tar-get owing to the Model Code of Conduct. Then the CM told them to meet the target in the coming days. On staff crunch in the Excise Depart-ment, the CM directed the officials to submit a pro-posal on the number of cons-tables, sub-inspectors and vehicles needed. The CM also launched a new software to simplify the functioning of the Excise Department.