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Journalism of Courage
More than half a dozen films, including Sarfarosh, Mission Kashmir and Fiza, have managed to illegally evade entertainment tax. The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has taken a strong objection to the Maharashtra government’s decision to grant exemptions to these films.
The CAG said it was a blatant violation of the rules prescribed under the Bombay Entertainments Duty Act, 1923. Under the Act, the state government is empowered to exempt any entertainment from payment of duty. For concession, a film should have won the President’s gold medal or have a recommendation by an advisory committee set up by the state government, which considers that the film fulfills educational, cultural or social purpose criteria.
The producer of a film granted an exemption must give an undertaking to pay an amount equivalent to the entertainment duty to a person nominated by the advisory committee. A scrutiny of the records of the Cultural Affairs and Revenue and Forest department, which granted exemption to eight films, revealed that no person had been nominated in any of the cases.
Weekly returns as prescribed were also not submitted by the producers to the District Collectors. As the conditions for exemptions were not fulfilled, orders declaring the films tax-free were supposed to be withdrawn. But no such action was taken by the government, as a result of which the state exchequer lost Rs 4.57 crore.
In 1998, CAG had an identical objection, saying that exemption granted to 64 films was in violation of the Bombay Entertainments Duty Act. Then the government had said that the rules were outdated and necessary steps would be taken to amend the law. However, while the law was not amended, the Cultural Affairs department continued to grant exemption.
