Arun Jaitley assures on-time payment of tax refund to exporters

New Delhi: Finance Minister Arun Jaitley assured exporters of timely payment of tax refund and promised steps to boost shipments, exporters body FIEO said. A delegation of exporters led by FIEO (Federation of Indian Export Organisations) President S C Ralhan, during the meeting, expressed concern about declining exports, the tough global scenario and domestic trading constraints. Ralhan told the Finance Minister that the order book position is not encouraging enough and impacts employment.

He urged Jaitley to increase liquidity for the sector and suggested a timely refund of duty drawback, CENVAT and service tax within 10 days. "The Finance Minister was supportive of both the issues and ensured timely action on the matter," FIEO said in a statement. The FIEO President also wanted FM's intervention to immediately introduce the interest subsidy scheme from April 1. The FM, on its part, promised to look into the matter with a view to imparting competitiveness to exports.

Ralhan also sought market development support either through a planned scheme with sizeable corpus or tax deduction under income tax for overseas expenditure on marketing. "For agriculture exports, the Finance Minister agreed to look into the issue of providing support in respect of commodities in which MSP is much above international prices so as to provide an avenue for their exports," it added. Contracting for the sixth month in a row, India's exports shrank 20.19 per cent in May to USD 22.34 billion.