21 IELTS centres in Punjab found evading tax of Rs 4 crore

Ruchika M Khanna

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Chandigarh, August 4

Suspecting large-scale tax evasion, the Punjab Taxation Department has started a drive to inspect all IELTS centres across the state. In a few days since the drive was launched, 21 centres have been found evading goods and services tax (GST) worth Rs 4 crore.

Information available with The Tribune reveals that many of these centres were receiving fee in cash, thus evading GST. At some other centres, the owners have been implementing GST provisions on select services, but not the entire package offered by them. Many others were found claiming more input tax credit than what was due to them.

It may be mentioned that there are around 1,000 IELTS training centres across the state. Their total GST contribution is estimated to be around Rs 1,000 crore.

Finance Minister Harpal Cheema told The Tribune that he had credible information regarding large-scale tax evasion by IELTS centres. It was found though the business was booming but the tax collected from these centres was comparatively low. It might be mentioned that 18 per cent GST is to be paid by these centres.

Taxation Commissioner KK Yadav said the department went in for data mining and data analysis, following which they shortlisted certain centres. “So far, we have found 21 centres evading GST in Ludhiana, Mohali, Jalandhar, Hoshiarpur, Amritsar, Malerkotla, Bathinda, Barnala, Ferozepur, Rajpura and Moga. The maximum evasion by a single centre is that of Rs 1 crore and the minimum is of Rs 3 lakh so far,” he said.