KOZHIKODE: Kallayi timber trade talks of a glorious history which includes supplying teak sleepers to Indian Railways across the country. Gone are the days of prosperity and now traders are fighting for survival. The government’s decision to make property mark registration mandatory has come as a jolt for the traders. They say they have to follow cumbersome process to get the property registration. To get the get the registration, they will need to have own timber yard to store timbers, Central Sale Tax, VAT registrations and TIN (Tax information network) certificates from Sales tax department and storing licence certificate from the Corporation, among others.
“It is practically impossible to obtain the registration after going through all these process. Former forest minister Binoy Vishwom had sought amendments in this issue realising the gravity of the situation,” says P.V Lakshmanan, former general secretary of Kozhikode Timber Association. Another issue is that a dozen of unscrupulous traders are ruling the roost with fake property mark registration obtained with the connivance of forest officials, allege traders.
“Genuine traders are left to fend for themselves whereas fake traders are thriving with authority’s support,” laments Arumugham, a timber merchant at Kallayi. Kallayi’s timber industry includes around 400 timber traders. There are many allied traders who keep the industry alive. The government introduced new rules to regularise the trade in Kallayi and to plug the loopholes that triggered black market. But traders are of the opinion that their several practical suggestions to seize black market were overlooked.
