MEGHALAYA LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

RE -ASSEMBLE BUDGET SESSION,  2004

BULLETIN NO. 6

(Friday, The 18^th June, 2004)

                The House met at 10 a.m. with the Hon'ble Speaker in the Chair. The day was devoted for the transaction of Government Business.

1.        QUESTIONS :

                Starred questions Nos. 63,67,69,70,71,73,74,75,77,78,80,81,83 and 84 with Supplementaries thereto, Nos. 62,66,79,82 and 85 without Supplementary were disposed of. Starred questions Nos. 64,65,68,72 and 76 lapsed since the questionnaires were absent.
                Unstarred questions Nos. 25 upto 37 to which written answers were given, were laid on the tables.

2.        POINT OF ORDER :

                Under Rule 300 of the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business, Smti Debora C. Marak, Minister incharge Mining and Geology raised a point of order with regard to the fate of her complaint she has submitted earlier against the hon. Member from Rongjeng, Shri P.G. Momin and wanted to know the latest position of the case.       (2)  She called for the reason as to why Assembly papers sometimes were delivered in the morning to the Members.
                In reply to the point of order, the Hon'ble Speaker apprised the House that definitely his Secretariat had received a complaint letter from Smti Debora C. Marak, Minister incharge Mining and Geology against an Independent Member from Rongjeng alleging that he had shifted to some political party being himself an Independent Member and that after he had carefully examined the complaint letter, he had issued a Show Cause Notice to him and he had already fixed the date for the receipt of his reply to the Show Cause Notice and that after receiving such reply he will further examine and then only he will inform the Member accordingly.

3.        VOTING ON DEMANDS FOR GRANTS :

                 Grants Nos. 1,2,3,4,5,6,7 and 8 were passed since there were no cut motion against these grants.
                 Shri J.D. Rymbai, Minister incharge Taxation moved Grant No 9.
                 Shri A. Choudhuri, moved his cut motion against this Grant. He discussed at length on the functioning of the Taxation Department vis-a-vis the leakage of revenue of the State. The hon. Member from Mawprem was of the opinion that there are certain loopholes in the assessment of taxes by the concerned department since he observed that  a huge number of assessment cases are lying pending for so many years with the department which has resulted in the decrease of tax collection. He also mentioned the failure of the department to detect cases of excess loads of trucks and also on the number of unregistered dealers. The mover of the cut motion suggested that the Government should grant some exception to the NGOs and hospitals and called for measures to streamline the entire Enforcement Wing and to fix certain norms to completed the assessment in time.
                    In reply to the points raised by the mover of the cut motion, Shri J.D. Rymbai, Minister incharge Taxation, apprised the House of the functioning of this department in general, the main objective of which, is to generate revenue to the State and to provide employment to the unemployed youth either directly or indirectly. He further stated that the department is trying to find out ways and means how to improve the methods and system to tag the leakages of revenue in the State especially at vulnerable check gates located at different parts of the State. Besides, he also informed that the department is keeping a strict vigilance by keeping checkers gates to see that the revenue may not leak. He stated that it is the department's sincere endevour to stop such leakages by resorting to the various existing Taxation Laws and Acts etc.
                    As regards delay in the assessment and in the filing of returns, he replied that after computerisation, it is expected that the situation will improve. On excess load, he informed that Rs.14 crores has been collected from excess loads in co-ordination with the Transport Department and it is expected that it will improve more. About Non-Registration of Dealers, he said that efforts are on to bring all eligible dealers within the tax net. As far as exemption, he said that this exemption is granted by taking into account the social aspect of the NGOs who require such concessions for welfare activities only for specific cases.
                    Since the time was up, the reply of the Minister incharge remains inconclusive. He will continue on the next day.

4.        ADJOURNMENT :

                    The House rose at 12 noon and stood adjourned till 10 a.m. on Monday, the 21st June, 2004.