New Delhi, July 26 (UNI) A Parliamentary standing committee in its report on the Entertain- ment sector has recommended that a mechanism be brought in place to curb the instances of tax evasion.”A mechanism is brought in place for continuous review of the possible sources of revenue being generated in the sector and update the system so as to keep pace with the con- temporary developments tak- ing place in the entertainment sector,” said the report recently tabled in Parliament.
The Committee in its report emphasized upon the need for fine tuning the e-systems coupled with efforts on rationalization of business codes used for ITR forms, refinement of infor- mation sharing mechanism, and strengthening monitoring mechanism. The Committee ap- preciated the initiatives taken by the Ministry of Finance such as the faceless assessment scheme, implementation of the non-filers monitoring system, the launch of ‘project insight’ to strengthen the non-intrusive information-driven approach to increasing tax compliance, and permitting the Aadhaar number to be used interchangeably in lieu of PAN in more than 100 forms. The Committee in its report noted that there has been a phenom- enal growth in the entertain- ment sector in the form of new segments such as short video platforms, digital streaming services, OTT, animation, VFX, podcasts audio-books and mo- bile and video games alongside other existing sub-sectors such as television, print, films, sports,radio and music etc.
“However, the dynamic nature of the industry poses a challenge of maintaining a balance in the growth of new sec- tors viz-a-viz ensuring that tax revenue is correspondingly en- hanced with the rise in avenues of income,” said the report. The Committee also looks towards witnessing the effectiveness of ITBA in enhancing transpar- ency and accountability for better implementation of the Income Tax Act and enhancing the reach of income tax author- ities to better target the evolv- ing areas of the entertainment sector,” said the report.
