*Drastic decline in load carriers entering State from last mid-night
Mohinder Verma
JAMMU, July 1: With Jammu and Kashmir opting out of one tax-one country regime, the adverse impact of unwarranted decision has become clearly visible from Day-1 and if the prevailing situation is allowed to persist even for a week the State will start reeling under shortage of essential commodities including life saving drugs as the available stocks are very limited.
According to the official statistics available with EXCELSIOR, before implementation of Goods and Services Tax (GST) by the Union Government from last mid-night, 1800 to 2000 trucks and other load carriers carrying essential commodities were entering the State from Lakhanpur every day. Similarly, around 1000 trucks mostly loaded with products of J&K were crossing Lakhanpur for different parts of country every day.
However, since last mid-night the number of incoming as well as outgoing load carriers has come down drastically as no businessmen, industrialist or trader in any part of the country is ready to carry out business with their counterparts in Jammu and Kashmir because of non-implementation of GST.
From last mid-night till this evening only 700 trucks entered Jammu and Kashmir from Lakhanpur Toll Post and the number of load-carriers leaving the State was even less than the incoming vehicles. Generally afternoon is considered as peak time at Lakhanpur Toll Post both for incoming and outgoing vehicles and on an average more than 1000 load carriers remain parked in the yards. But only 100 vehicles were seen parked in the yards at Lakhanpur this afternoon.
These figures clearly reveal the adverse impact of failure of the PDP-BJP Government to implement Goods and Services Tax (GST) from last mid-night when the new tax regime became applicable in rest of the country.
“The prevailing scenario indicates that in the coming days J&K will start facing shortage of essential commodities”, an officer of State Government posted at Lakhanpur told EXCELSIOR, adding had J&K taken timely decision about implementation of GST on the pattern of other States there would have been no decline in import of essential commodities to the State.
According to the information gathered by EXCELSIOR from different wholesale markets, due to the confusion about implementation of GST the wholesale merchants, on one side, had stopped importing essential commodities and other products and on the other side left no stone unturned to clear the available stocks.
“There was no clarity as to what would be the fate of stocks which were brought under the previous tax regime following imposition of GST as such we decided not to make imports and pay attention towards clearance of available stocks”, said a wholesale merchant of Jammu.
President of Chamber of Commerce and Industry Jammu, Rakesh Gupta, when contacted, said, “due to inability of the State Government to take timely decision about implementation of GST, we had in advance advised our members not to make fresh imports. Moreover, there was confusion about billing of the commodities imported under the previous tax regime from July 1, 2017 onwards”.
Though the Chamber President claimed that at present there were enough stocks of all the items yet he admitted that if implementation of GST is delayed beyond one week the people will start bearing the brunt. “We are hopeful of early resolution of prevailing crisis as Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti and Finance Minister Dr Haseeb Drabu have categorically conveyed the Chamber that decision would be taken during the forthcoming session of Legislature at any cost”, he added.
President of Chamber of Traders Federation, Neeraj Anand, when contacted, said, “the stocks in the wholesale markets are not sufficient to meet the demand of people beyond one week and if the decision on GST implementation is delayed further there will be chaos in the State”, adding “during the past several days the focus was entirely on liquidating of available stocks because of lack of clarity over the provisions of new tax regime”.
“Nobody is ready to conduct business with us under the old tax regime as by doing so they will be inviting trouble for them as such unless GST is implemented J&K would not be able to import anything”, he said while disclosing that even the stocks of the medicines were not sufficient to meet the requirement beyond one week. He hoped that better senses will prevail and the PDP-BJP Coalition Government take decision in favour of GST to prevent the State from facing the impending crisis.
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