AKITDA registers its first victory

AKITDA, the newly-born association registered its first victory when
Fisheries Minister, Dominic Presentation took the issue of double taxation in IT
business seriously during first State convention organized by asso-ciation last
week at Cochin. While speaking on this issue, raised by association the mini-ster
announced that the State Government would seriously consider on the roll back of
double taxation at the earliest. Presentation was attending this convention as
chief guest. He also urged the resellers to come out with an effective mechanism
to ensure tax payment at any single point.

The All Kerala IT Dealers Association (AKITDA) was formed in April this year
and it claims to have more than 1,000 members across the State

Considering the promise made by Fisheries Minister a big achievement, C
Santhosh Kumar, State President, AKITDA said, "This was the first
convention of our association and getting such a good response from minister is
more than what we expected. AKITDA will emerge as a very strong association in
the State. The new association will work towards protecting the interest of each
segment, be it vendor, distributor, channel partner or consumer. Soon, we will
take up some more issues with the State government and get it resolved."

Presently, the channel community in Kerala is paying 4.6 percent tax at time
of buying components, and another 4.6 percent on complete product means at the
time of selling PC after assembling it. It is also important here to note that
the Kerala Government in the recent budget had announced that it would collect
tax in two parts, first, three percent at the time of the first sale and second
one percent at the time of selling the product to end-user. This mode of tax
collection is applicable on all trades.

However this decision was criticized from all the quarters and the government
had to withdraw it immediately. "In Kerala, we have many such issues which
are needed to be sorted out. For this we need strong association which can
represent the entire com-munity and its problems. AKITDA was formed against the
backdrop of protecting the interests of each industry segment," said Reghu
Warrier, State General Secretary, AKITDA.

The association has set up complaint cell across the State, where anyone
(vendor/distributor/channel partner/consumer) can register their complaint,
which will get immediate attention. "This is basically to avoid any
confro-ntation between the parties and solve the issues amicably without
approaching the court," said K Vijayachandra Menon, President, AKITDA
Ernakulam Chapter.The asso-ciation is also issuing the I-cards to all its
members.

DQW News Bureau

Chennai