Overview
- CII met Revenue Secretary Arvind Shrivastava on Oct. 31 to submit a detailed tax-reform memorandum for Budget 2026-27.
- Citing over five lakh pending appeals involving nearly Rs 18 lakh crore, it urged fast-tracking all cases above Rs 100 crore within one year with CBDT monitoring, suspension of parallel penalties, and sharing of draft orders for factual checks.
- The chamber proposed collapsing the TDS/TCS framework to two or three categories and exempting transactions between GST-registered entities, along with clarifying that GST components in composite payments are not subject to TDS.
- It called for reviving the Authority for Advance Rulings as an independent, judge-led body with six-month timelines, enacting a statutory Taxpayer Rights Charter, and setting a multi-year corporate tax roadmap with decriminalisation of minor non-wilful offences.
- For customs, CII sought a phased shift to a Paper-Free system by 2028 with e-refunds, e-adjudication, and e-appeals, plus a one-time dispute-resolution scheme, simplified consolidated appeals, and rationalised tariff notifications.