The Goa State Assembly Budget Session conducted on July 27 witnessed utter chaos as 11 crucial Bills were introduced and subsequently passed owing to avoidance of the Ordinance lapse.
Leading to an absolute ruckus in the House, the Goa Legislative Assembly in its one-day monsoon session passed 11 important Bills which include The Goa Agricultural Produce Marketing (Development and Regulation) (Amendment) Bill 2020, The Goa Motor Vehicles Tax (3rd Amendment) Bill 2020, The Industrial Disputes (Goa Amendment) Bill 2020, The Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) (Goa Amendment) Bill 2020, The Factories (Goa Amendment) Bill 2020, The Goa (Recovery of Arrears of Tax through Settlement) (Amendment) Bill 2020, The Goa Goods and Services Tax (2nd Amendment) Bill 2020, The Court Fee (Goa Amendment) Bill 2020, The Goa Town and Country Planning (Amendment) Bill 2020, The Goa Value Added Tax (12th Amendment) Bill 2020 and The Indian Stamp (Goa Amendment) Bill 2020.
As far as the business, trade and industry in the State is concerned, we have highlighted a few details of the Bills passed during this one-day session:
1) The Industrial Disputes Bill, 2020 sought to amend section 2-A of the 1947 Act wherein it was considered expedient to provide a time limit with regards to raising disputes. The Bill thus provides a time limit of one year for raising industrial disputes covered under sub section (1) of Section 2-A of the said Act by way of insertion of sub-section (4). Further, the time limit in sub-section (3) has been reduced from three years to one year in order to achieve speedy disposal of disputes arising out of discharge, dismissal, retrenchment or termination of workmen and disputes raised after several years that cause difficulty in settling the same.
The Bill also amends Section 25-F clause (b) to enhance the payment of 15 days average pay to payment of 45 days average pay for completed years of continuous service in relation to retrenchment. Further, Section 25-N sub-section (9) has also been amended that makes the process of retrenchment and closure less painful and tedious for both employers and employees. Section 25-K of the Act has been substituted to increase number of workmen from 100 to 300 with the aim to encourage employers to employ more workers in industrial establishments. Moreover, while a new section namely Section 31-A has been inserted to make a provision for compounding offences under the Act; the Bill also sought to insert Section 36-C to empower the State Government from provisions of the Act thus encouraging investors to set up new industries. No financial implications are involved in this Bill.
2) The Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) (Goa Amendment) Bill 2020 aims at increasing the threshold limit of
applicability of the 1970 Act from 20 to 50 or more contractual employees with the object of facilitating the initiatives undertaken in the field of labour reforms. As a result of this amendment, establishments and contractors employing less than 50 workers as contract labour will not be required to register or obtain a license under the Act. This is a significant change for establishments with small scale operations and those who rely on outsourced work force for their activities.
Further, the Bill sought to insert a new Section 25-A that makes a provision for compounding offences under the Act. No financial implications are involved in this Bill.
3) The Factories (Goa Amendment) Bill 2020 was passed with a view to provide a much needed boost to the manufacturing sector in order to facilitate the ease of doing business and create more employment opportunities. The Bill sought to amend Section 2(m)(i) wherein the words ten or more workers are substituted with twenty or more workers and Section 2(m)(ii) wherein the words twenty or more workers are substituted with forty or more workers.
It further amends Section 85 of the Act wherein the existing threshold limit on number of workers for applicability of the Act is elevated from 10 or more workers to 20 or more workers for power aided factories and from 20 or more workers to 40 or more workers for non-power aided factories.
It also sought to insert a new section namely Section 5-A in the said Act, so as to enable the State Government to exempt, subject to such conditions as it may think fit, any new factory or class or description of new factories which are established and whose commercial production start, from all or any of the provisions of the Act for a period of one thousand days from the date on which such commercial production starts, so as to create more economic activities and employment opportunities.
4) The Goa Town and Country Planning (Amendment) Bill 2020 sought to amend Sections 2, 16, 16-A, 17-A and 44 of the 1974 Act so as to exclude activities undertaken in pursuance of permissions and licenses granted under the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act, 1957 and rules made there under. The financial memorandum of the said Bill estimated approximately Rs. 1 Crore which will be generated by way of renewing and approving grant of quarrying leases which are currently unable to be processed due to the conflict between the Legislature and the issue of new quarrying leases.
5) The Goa Value Added Tax (12th Amendment) Bill 2020 sought to amend the 2005 Act, in the light of the recent judgment of the Hon’ble High Court based on the interpretation of Section 33 of the Goa VAT Act, 2005 read with Rule 30 of the Goa VAT Rules, 2005 regarding payment of interest on refund of Tax. This Bill sought to amend Section 10(3) and fixed the time limit of giving refund from 3 months from the date of order of the sanctioning authority in case of an application for refund. This Bill further sought to insert sub section (10) to Section 29 of the Act fixing a time limit for the assessing authority to submit a refund proposal to the sanctioning authority. This Bill also sought to amend Section 33(2) thereby fixing a time limit of giving refund from 90 days from date of order of the sanctioning authority in case of an application for refund under Section 10(3). This Bill does not involve any recurring or non-recurring expenditure from the Consolidated Fund of the State.
6) The Goa Goods and Services Tax (2nd Amendment) Bill 2020 amends clauses (b), (c) and (d) of Section 10(2) of the 2017 Act to correspond with the eligibility conditions for opting to pay tax under Section 10 (1) and (2A) of the Act. It amends Section 16(4) to delink the date of issuance of the debit note from the date of issuance of the underlying invoice for purposes of availing input tax credit, Section 29(1)(c) to provide for cancellation voluntarily obtained registration under Section 25(3), substitutes the provision to Section 30(1) to empower the Additional Commissioner and Commissioner to extend the time limit for filing an application to revoke cancellation of registration, amends Section 31 to empower the Government to notify categories of services and supplies with respect to tax invoices will be issued and make related rules, amends Section 51, thereby empowering the Government to make rules for proving the manner in which a certificate of tax deduction at source shall be issued and omits sub section (4). This Bill further sought to insert a new sub-section namely (1A) to Section 122 of the Act making the beneficiary of certain transactions liable for penalty. Moreover, it amends various other vital sections of the Act such as Sections 132, 140, 172, etc. this Bill also, does not involve any recurring or non-recurring expenditure from the Consolidated Fund of the State.
Procedurally speaking, since the Goa Government had passed the ordinances with respect to the above Bills, the Bills were then introduced in the House and have to be passed within a period of six months failing which the ordinances lapse.
Commenting on these amendments made to the labour laws, Adv. Prasanna Chawdikar, well known labour law practitioner from Goa, said that the need to amend the above legislations arose solely due to the COVID-19 pandemic as not only the state but the nation and the globe is facing difficult times. The Centre as well as State Governments, with a view to combat the virus have issued several Notifications, Circulars, Guidelines and Orders for the citizens and Employers (be it Advisory or Orders).
He further said, “It is pertinent to note that the lockdown announced by the Prime Minister of India came into effect from 25th March 2020. As a result, all movements, whether men or materials related came to a complete standstill (essential services being exempted). There could neither be any manufacturing, trading, imparting services or ability to provide work, nor were employees in a position to discharge their obligations. The entire industry was struggling to support both the working class as well as industrialists. These amendments have been brought into force as there were representations made to the Government by all the concerned parties. Let us hope that these amendments will be in the interest of the management as well as labour class, which will ultimately lead to the benefit of Goa!”
Offering his comments on The Goa Goods and Services Tax (2nd Amendment) Bill 2020, Chartered Accountant Gaurav Kenkre says, “Besides the amendments already mentioned, there are two more very important amendments to the Act. Firstly, Section 168A has been introduced which can be referred to as a ‘Force majeure’ section, necessitated by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. This provision gives the Government powers to notify extension in time limits of various compliances, on account of war, epidemic, flood, drought, fire, cyclone, earthquake or any other calamity caused by nature and is a welcome move.
Further, the validity of Section 172 has been extended from three years to five years. Section 172 empowered the Government to notify any changes for the ‘removal of difficulties’ in implementing the GST Act. This provision was initially seen as useful for the early stages of GST implementation and was kept active only till 30/06/2020 (i.e. three years from date of introduction of GST). Now the same has been expanded to five years, thus adding two more years where the Government can issue such ‘removal of difficulty’ orders. In the past, it has been seen that these have normally helped the trade at large!”
