Bharat Bandh: Traders body CAIT has called for an all-India shutdown.
New Delhi:
The body of major traders, the Confederation of Traders of India (CAIT), has called for a nationwide shutdown over rising fuel prices, the goods and services tax and the new E-Way invoice, a permit associated with the movement of goods. About 40,000 trade associations have extended their support for the shutdown call, protesters said.
The demonstrations are expected to take place in 1,500 towns and cities, the association said. The All India Carrier Welfare Association, the leading body for the Indian trucking sector, will also join the protest and carry out roadblocks across the country.
Farmers unions, which have been campaigning against the three controversial farm laws, have also expressed solidarity.
“Harassed by complicated GST rules, eight crore merchants and 1 lakh carriers will join Bharat Bandh today as a mark of protest against the distorted GST,” CAIT said in a tweet last night, demanding simplification of the tax. . “The tax is not ‘good’ or ‘simple’,” he said in one of the posts on Twitter.
Commercial markets are also likely to remain closed as the All India Federation of Consumer Products Distributors, the representative body for four lakh distributors, has also joined the shutdown.
Carrier body AITWA has demanded the removal of the “regressive” e-way rules, which it says “requires impractical compliance by carriers.
“The sender or sender of goods must complete the detail of their goods in the online portal, in part A and the carrier must update the vehicle not in part B. Carriers must cover the total trip at 200 km / day, from the sender’s place to the consignee’s place according to the PIN code calculated at the shortest distance. This is practically not possible due to many factors such as Sunday / holiday, accident, partial load consolidation, hub and radio, congestion en route or in the place of unloading, personal problems of the driver and many others. “
Emphasizing that carriers “are being scapegoated by tax officials,” AITWA has further said: “Any error or expiration of the transportation invoice due to any error is severely and unpleasantly penalized at 200 percent of the tax value, or 100 percent of the invoice value under Section 129 of the CGST Act of 2017, even when there is no tax loss for the Government. “
“Carriers will stop all their operations and park their vehicles as a symbolic protest. Transportation companies will approach all customers not to reserve or load goods on February 26, 2021,” said Mahendra Arya, AITWA National President, it’s a statement. .
Last week, CAIT Secretary General Praveen Khandelwal said that “so far almost 950 amendments to the GST rules have been made in the last four years and the issues related to glitches in the GST portal and the continued increase in the compliance burden are the main loopholes in the tax regime. ”
Amid rising fuel prices, the government is already being targeted by opposition parties. This is the first national closure on the subject.
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