United we Succeed : Divided we Fail
Times of India ( 29 Sept 2016 ) carries a news report titled :
" CCEA clears Rs 2,256 cr project for CBEC's GST
integration "
Details are :
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CCEA
today cleared a Rs 2,256 crore IT project Saksham
of the Central Board of Excise and Customs, which will help integrate CBEC's system with the GST network before the rollout in April next year.
The
implementation strategy for the project will be to ensure readiness of CBEC's
IT framework by April, 1, 2017, when GST is to be introduced, an official
statement read.
The
Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA), chaired by Prime Minister
Narendra Modi has approved Project Saksham,
a New Indirect Tax Network (Systems Integration) of
CBEC.
Project
Saksham will help in implementation of
goods and services tax (GST), extension
of the Indian Customs Single Window Interface for Facilitating Trade (SWIFT) and other taxpayer-friendly initiatives
under Digital India and Ease of Doing
Business of CBEC.
"All
taxpayers/importers/exporters/dealers under various indirect tax laws administered
by CBEC -- presently about 36 lakh -- are likely to go up to over 65 lakh after
introduction of GST," the statement added.
CBEC's
IT structure needs to integrate with the Goods and Services Tax Network (GSTN) for processing of registration, payment
and returns data sent to CBEC as well as
act as a front-end for other modules like audit,
appeal and investigation.
There
is no overlap in the GST-related systems
of CBEC and GSTN, the statement said.
"This
IT infrastructure is also urgently required for continuation of CBEC's
e-services in Customs, central excise and service tax, implementation of
taxpayer services such as scanned document upload facility, extension of Indian
Customs SWIFT initiative and integration with government
initiatives such as e-nivesh, e-taal and e-sign,"
the statement added.
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Indeed
a very good beginning at integrating
Government Departments / Databases / Processes
I
hope , someday soon , NDA government will take the next step described below ( and sent to all Ministers as email )
:
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Thursday, 3 April 2014
E - Governance ?
Can e-Governance help
eliminate corruption ?
Most certainly
Look at the following ,
partial list of Central and State Agencies set up to fight fraud ,
money-laundering , corruption , tax-evasion , economic crimes etc :
> Public Accounts
Committee (
PAC )
> Central Vigilance
Commission ( CVC )
> Central Information
Commission ( CIC )
> Research and Analysis
Wing (
RAW )
> Serious Fraud
Investigation Office ( SFIO )
> Information
Bureau
( IB )
> Economic Offence Wing
( EOW )
> Central Bureau of
Investigation ( CBI )
> Department of Revenue
Intelligence ( DIR )
> Comptroller and
Auditor General ( CAG )
> Anti Corruption
Bureaus ( States ).... ( ACB )
> Enforcement
Directorate
( ED )
> Lok
Ayukts ( States )
> Lok
Pal ( Central
)
Despite such an army of
Agencies , how do corrupt manage to get away ?
Or , in case caught , manage to
delay delivery of punishment for years ?
No doubt , there must be
several reasons , including , inter - agency rivalry to get credit - something
difficult to eliminate altogether
But , I believe , the most
important reason is :
Lack of a COMMON / COMPUTERIZED
database of all offences / cases / persons being investigated
And , which is readily "
Accessible " to all of these Agencies , all over the country ( 24 * 365 )
Already , every Agency
compiles huge dossiers on " Suspects " in its own
" Departmental Database " , which is never
shared with other Agencies ,
leading to ,
> Huge amount
of duplication of efforts / information
> Fractured /
scattered profiles of " Suspects "
> Enormous
waste of time / resources
What will help ?
> Dismantling of
individual departmental databases
> Merging of all
Agency-wise databases into a SINGLE / UNIQUE
database
> All Agencies to
enter their findings / data / info into this COMMON
database
, with nothing preserved on local computers
> All data-entry FORMS to be ONLINE
. No paper forms at all
> All local
computers connected to ultra-secure Network ( Encrypted
)
> " Access
Rights " to individuals , based on Biometric
Identification
Will BJP want to make this ,
a prominent promise in their Poll-Manifesto , likely to be released on 7th
April ? ( Congress / AAP missed this boat ! )
It is high time political
parties stop talking of motherhood in vague terms and start telling the voters
,
" If you vote us to
power , this is precisely what we will do , to bring about E-GOVERNANCE - and do it within 6 months of
assuming power "
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30 Sept 2016