More than 8 crore traders are expected to join the Bharat Vyapar Bandh call of Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) today. Joining them will be transporters, hawkers, small-scale industries and women entrepreneurs, claimed CAIT. As part of the protests, these traders will pull down the shutters today.
In addition, the Vyapar Bandh is supported by the All India Transport Welfare Association (AITWA), the apex organisation of about 1 crore transporters of the country. So, the transport across the country will also remain closed.
Several state-level organisations of chartered accountants and tax advocates in various states have supported the bandh, stated traders association.
National President of CAIT, BC Bhartia said about 1,500 big and small organisations from all over the country will protest. Adding to it, CAIT, Secretary General, Praveen Khandelwal said in order to ensure that no inconvenience is caused to the people of the country due to the Bharat Vyapar bandh, the CAIT has excluded essential services, medicine shops, milk, vegetables shops etc. from the bandh.
Why is this bandh:
This is mainly against several provisions made through several amendments in Goods and Service Tax (GST) rules and also to demand issuance of changes in the FDI policy to curb the notoriety and arbitrariness of foreign companies in the e-commerce trade.
On December 22, even after many unilateral amendments made in the GST rules, it has generated irk of the traders. The traders feel that these amendments give arbitrary powers to the tax authorities. The traders argued now any officer can suspend or cancel the GST registration number of any trader for any reason, according to this discretion. In addition, the bank account and property of any trader can be confiscated too without any show cause notice and no opportunity of hearing, claimed CAIT.
Traders cannot possibly take credit for their money which is deposited with the tax department as input. Apart from this, there are many other rules which are hitting the traders, CAIT stated.
CAIT stated the new rules will breed manifold corruption and the traders will be harassed and victimised.
The traders also want to stop the foreign e-commerce companies from violating the laws and continuance of unethical business practices in an arbitrary manner. It also wants the government to take strict action against e-commerce companies that have violated the law.
