Recovery of excess refunds: more powers for tax officials under consideration

The Central Board of Revenue (CBR) is seriously considering to enhance the powers of tax officials for the recovery of excess refund amount erroneously paid to taxpayers. The CBR has drafted three notifications giving more powers to sales tax officials and central excise officials where powers of customs officials including additional collectors and deputy collectors will also be enhanced.
Sources told Business Recorder here on Tuesday that the first notification has been framed under section 179 of the Custom Act, 1969, under which the Board can revise the jurisdiction and powers of any customs officer. It will empower collectors of customs to deal with cases involving duties and taxes without any specific limit; additional collectors will deal with cases involving duties and taxes not exceeding Rs 25 million; deputy collectors will deal with cases involving duties and taxes up to Rs 5 million; and assistant collectors will have the authority to deal with cases involving duties and taxes up to Rs 1 million.
The second notification has been drafted under section 45 (Power of Adjudication) of Sales Tax Act, 1990.
According to the proposed SRO, the collectors of sales tax will be empowered to deal with cases falling under sub-section (2) of section 11 and section 36 of Sales Tax Act without any restriction as to the amount of tax involved, amount erroneously refunded and contravention cases.
Additional collector, sales tax will have the authority to deal with cases falling under sub-section (2) of section 11 and section 36 of Sales Tax Act provided that the amount of tax involved, amount erroneously refunded and contravention cases does not exceed Rs 25 million.
Deputy collector, sales tax will deal with cases falling under sub-section (1) of section 11. He will also deal with cases falling under sub-section (2) of section 11 and section 36 of Sales Tax Act provided the amount of tax involved, amount erroneously refunded and contravention cases does not exceed Rs 5 million.
The third notification has been drafted under sub-section (2) of section 33 of Central Excise Act, 1944. It proposes to revise the adjudication powers of central excise officers including collector, additional collector and deputy collector.
According to the draft notification, Collector will deal with cases involving evasion of central excise duty (principal amount) or erroneous refund of excise duty without limit.
Additional collector will deal with cases involving evasion of central excise duty (principal amount) or erroneous refund of excise duty provided the amount of duty involved does not exceed Rs 25 million.
Deputy collector will deal with cases involving evasion of CED (principal amount) or erroneous refund of excise duty provided the amount of duty involved does not exceed Rs 5 million. He will also deal with all cases of contravention or rules where no evasion of duty is involved.