Kochi, Jul 12 (KNN) The Kerala Merchants have decided to boycott the newly implemented procedure of submitting a declaration as required by the Commercial Taxes Department for bringing merchandise from other states by road.
 
The decision was taken in a meeting of merchants held under the aegis of Kerala Merchants Union here yesterday. The merchants will boycott the procedure from July 15.
 
The Kerala Merchants’ Union had urged the state government to revoke the newly-implemented system of filing 8F form online. The Sales Tax Department had recently issued guidelines for controlling goods’ trafficking such that the buyer should file the form online rather than the transporting companies who used to fill it earlier.
 
The President of the union recently said in a press statement that the 8F form has to be filled by providing the vehicle registration number, driver’s name and licence number, which are usually not known to the buyer.
 
The union said that the buyer would not be aware about the details about the transporting vehicle, the driver and the departure time, according to media reports.
 
The new measures have also resulted in the dumping of goods at the state’s check posts, the union said.
 
The union also said that electronic mode for filing the documents is not feasible as the merchants who operate from limited facilities without computers will be forced to disclose the secret password and identification number allocated to them, leading to misuse by a third party.

A number of organisations in goods transport, textile business, food processing and small scale industries participated in the discussions. (KNN Bureau)