ReSTART Assam to generate own revenue: Chief Minister

By our Staff Reporter

GUWAHATI, Nov 29: Chief Minister Sarbanda Sonowal laid stress on generating State's own revenue to meet the basic non-plan expenditure of salary and pension in the 1st Apex Committee Meeting of Restructuring Systems and Technology for Augmentation of Resources for Transformed Assam (ReSTART Assam), which was held on Tuesday here.

Sonowal said that the Government aims to surge ahead with a focussed motto and program of ReSTART Assam in order to ensure maximum possible use of the State's own resources through a concerted and coordinated mission mode program. Keeping this in mind, the Chief Minister directed the major revenue earning departments in the meeting to rationalize revenue collection, mobilize additional resources, focus on investment in critical sectors to induce growth, and implement large-scale IT-enabled systems with near-zero human interfaces such as online payment and receipt of revenue and real-time monitoring of revenue collection.

The Chief Minister also reviewed the present status of revenue collection of Taxation, Excise, Transport, Forest, Land Revenue & Registration, Mines & Minerals Department and directed the officials to look into policy restructuring, amendment of legislation and introduction of new rules, cadre restructuring, capacity building and training of manpower as well as vigilance & monitoring for the realization of the enhanced revenue.

The Chief Minister further directed officers of the departments concerned to introduce policy initiatives to enhance the flow of revenue in a time frame manner. He also directed for early completion of land re-classification, integrated online portal for payment of land revenue and monitoring land sale permission, toning up revenue administration, the introduction of GST regime, policy changes in excise department for higher revenue collection, etc.   

State Finance Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, Industry Minister Chandra Mohan Patowary, Forest Minister Pramila Rani Brahma, PWD Minister Parimal Suklabaidya, Chief Secretary VK Pipersenia and other senior officials of State Government were present in the meeting.