Telangana state set for major admin reforms

Hyderabad: Major administrative reforms are on the cards in Telangana. The key revenue generating Transport, Stamps and Registrations, Excise, Prohibition and Commercial Taxes departments are set to go in for major changes to improve the efficiency of the officials and ensure that there was no leakage in tax collections.

Apart from bringing in a new Revenue Act to ensure a transparent land administration, the State government is keen to bring in major changes in the other key departments by the end of this year. The government has already decided to create more number of Excise stations in the identified areas, where liquor sales are high. Hence it has created new posts of the rank of Additional Commissioners and Assistant Commissioners.

Top officials of the state administration said that special focus was being laid on revenue generating wings. State Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar, who also heads Commercial Taxes department, is analysing the performance of the officials in the entire wing. He is also recommending strengthening of the entire Commercial Taxes department and the same will be submitted to Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao for approval before the beginning of the Assembly session.

Currently, the officials of the State Commercial Taxes department were assigned to collect VAT on fuels and streamlining the traders list online for GST collections. All the identified loopholes in tax collections were rectified. To overcome the future challenges, the officials were being provided training with high end technology to curb the hi-tech cheating by traders in tax payments reported in the recent times.

The Stamps and Registration department, which is considered as one of the big revenue generating sources, was undergoing major transformation with the adoption of paperless administrative mechanism. A set of big reforms aiming to check corruption and misuse of power in the land registrations is under preparation.

The government will overhaul the entire wing soon. The State Transport department was already upgraded by introducing 100 per cent online registration of vehicles and issuance of driving licences.

The major hurdle before the government to end corruption is the existing agent mafia colluded with the officials.

A major shakeup in the administration of all the above mentioned key departments will take place in a phased manner and the officials will be made more accountable in generating targeted revenues to meet the financial requirements of the State.

A proposal to create Telangana Administrative Services (TAS) is also under consideration to fill all vacancies in Revenue , Excise, Commercial taxes, Transport and Stamps departments. The job aspirants who wanted to join the services in these wings will have to possess special skills in financial management and revenue generation. A clarity on the creation of TAS will come at the time of adoption of new Revenue Act in the Assembly.