CAIT has urged FM to extend last date of filing annual GST return

The Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) in a communication she to Union Finance Minister Shri Arun Jaitley today has urged the extension of last date for filing Annual GST Return from 31st December 2018 to 31st March 2019. In its communication to Mr. Jaitley, the CAIT has invoked his attention towards GST mandate for filing Annual GST Return for the period ending March,2018 for which the last date is 31st December,2018. The CAIT informed him that till today the format of filing of Annual GST Return and even option is not available anywhere including on GST website as well. The Annual GST Return assumes mush significance as it gives last opportunity to assesses to rectify their previous return filed with the Department for the concerned year. Under such circumstances it will not be possible for the traders to file their Annual GST Return by the stipulated period and aa a immediate measure, the CAIT has urged to extend the last date of filing Annual GST Return upto 31st March 2019 for the period 2017-18. CAIT National President Mr. B.C.Bhartia and Secretary General Mr. Praveen Khandelwal said that it is to be noted that the concept of Annual GST Return is still not known to large number of traders across the Country being the first year of GST implementation. They further said that in previous VAT or Sales Tax regime there was no concept of filing any Annual Tax Return and 2017-18 being the first year of GST implementation in the Country most of the traders registered with GST are not even aware of the obligation of filing Annual GST Return. Moreover, it is also not known to them that Annual Return is the last opportunity for the assesses to rectify their Returns so as to avoid any denial of Input Tax Credit which in turn could also be resulted into unwanted tax recovery. While urging for extension of the last date, the CAIT has suggested that a widespread national campaign should be launched by the Government to make assesses aware about the liability of filing Annual GST Return and its process. Further, it has also urged that format and option of Annual GST Return should be made available on GST portal immediately and even in regional languages as well.