Government finds a way to make taxes sweeter. Will it work?

“Death, taxes and childbirth! There’s never any convenient time for any of them,” Scarlett O’Hara had declared in Gone with the Wind. Most people today would still vouch for that sentiment, especially the second. More so since the government has been telling Indian taxpayers via commercials that they had better pay up now or pay dearly later.

Now, there seems to be a change of heart somewhere, and the new tack appears to be to cajole, not coerce. Given our famously sweet tooth, the Central Board of Excise & Customs ( CBEC) approach to “popularise/publicise the Service Tax Voluntary Compliance Encouragement Scheme (VCES)” at the ongoing India International Trade Fair in New Delhi should be tempting: VCES ke laddoo.

This viand is being given to winners of VCES quiz contests at the CBEC pavilion but its efficacy in ensuring or enforcing compliance is not apparent. Nor is it clear how “painting contests, mime, face painting and magic shows” will do the needful either, unless potential service tax avoiders are so overwhelmed by their offspring getting blandishments from the CBEC — certificates and gifts — that they rush off to do the needful.

Hopefully, these VCES laddoos will be different from the proverbial ones distributed at marriages that cause both who eat them and those who don’t to regret their actions!