Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government is yet to collect arrear revenues to the tune of Rs 23,540.51 crore till March 2022. Out of the total amount, revenues worth Rs 14,440.58 crore has not been realised due to cases in different courts. This was informed by Odisha Finance Minister Niranjan Pujari in a written reply in the Assembly recently.
Pujari informed said the total outstanding commercial tax is Rs 11,592.83 crore, outstanding electricity duty stood at Rs 4187.61 crore, stamp duty Rs 217.57 crore, agriculture water rate – Rs 22.57 crore, MV tax – Rs 311.75 crore, industrial water rate—Rs 4914.56 crore and forest development tax – Rs 131.39 crore.
While cases related to revenue arrears worth Rs 614.90 crore are pending in the Supreme Court, other arrear cases of Rs 8678.44 crore and Rs 5147.23 crore respectively are to be decided by the Orissa High Court and other courts.
The cases of revenue arrears are in different categories- commercial tax (Rs 6779.68 crore), electricity duty (Rs 1,534.90 crore), mining royalty (Rs 2070.03 crore), excise duty (Rs 92.20 crore), MV tax (Rs 81.12 crore), industrial water rate (Rs 3,830.36 crore) and forest development tax (Rs 52.29 crore).
For speedy trial of pending revenue arrear cases, the government has been appointing advocate general, public prosecutor, assistant public prosecutors and standing counsel. For some important cases, the government also hires special counsel, Pujari informed.
For collection of the revenue dues, the Minister said that the Odisha government has taken some important measures including appointment of special counsel, high-level review meeting by Chief Secretary, out-of-court one time settlement, etc.
The appellate authorities have been asked to complete the pending commercial tax related cases within a specified timeline, he added.