Report by OD bureau, Bhubaneswar: In order to bring more transparency and also to provide better and simplified electronic service to the beneficiaries, an effort is being made for the first time in the state of Odisha to facilitate sharing of information relating to transport of minerals between the Steel & Mines Department and Commercial Tax Department by integrating the IT systems providing e-Services to all the beneficiaries in the State as well as outside the State.

The Miners (lessees) and the Traders (licensees) involved in mining and trading activities respectively are required to obtain prescribed permits for mining and transporting the minerals. These entities, wherever statutory provisions apply, are also required to be registered under Odisha VAT Act and Odisha Entry Tax Act and CST Act, as the case may be. To facilitate transportation of minerals outside the State a waybill is required from the Commercial Tax Department besides a transit Pass/ Permit from the Steel & Mines Department. At present these documents are available from the two separate IT systems owned and maintained by the above mentioned two Departments providing electronic services. Now an effort is being made to integrate these two systems to provide a simpler and faster way to obtain these documents, as the case may be, to these beneficiaries which would also result in a more transparent and conductive environment both.

After detailed deliberations between both the Departments as well as the stake holders in both the systems, it has been decided to integrate the system at three different levels:

(i) The entities TIN would be automatically verified by the Steel & Mines Department System from the Commercial Tax Department System, which will provide a single identification to all the beneficiaries.

(ii) For transport of minerals outside the State by road or rail, the Transit Passes generated from the Steel & Mines Department System would be imported into Commercial Tax Department System which will result in generating the e-Waybills, with substantially reduced input to be provided by the Dealers under the Commercial Tax Department.

(iii) The returns filed by the lessees and licensees in the Steel & Mines Department would also be imported into the Commercial Tax Department System in order to have better transparency and cross checking of information relating to the mineral business in the State by both the Departments and to detect tax evasion, if any.

This integration will lead to a situation where the lessees / licensees will be able to generate e-Waybills from the Commercial Tax Department system immediately after they generate the Transit Passes from the Steel & Mines Department. There will be no need to input all the information relating to the specific consignment under transport in the Commercial Tax Department system.

This process will also help the Government in generating almost real-time information relating to the minerals business in the State, whether, it relates to mining activities or trading activities.

This will ensure that the lessees and licensees under the Steel & Mines Department are registered with the Commercial Tax Department as applicable under the statutes. This will also help the government to monitor the activities to ensure better compliance in the State.

While this above integration is the first of its kind in the country, efforts are also being made to further integrate the IT systems of both the Departments to provide even better e-service to the beneficiaries, business entities in the State and also to create a more efficient transparent and responsive system.