Chamber of Associations of Maharashtra Industry & Trade (CAMIT) acknowledging the efforts of Union and State Government in containing the spread of Covid-19 virus in India voiced the demand of business community from the State particularly medium and small enterprises in letters addressed to Nirmala Sitharaman, FM & chairperson of COVID-19 Task Force, Prime Minister – Narendra Modi, Commerce Minister – Piyush Goyal, MSME Minister – Nitin Gadkari, MoS Finance – Anurag Thakur, Chief Minister Maharashtra – Uddhav Thackeray and Finance Minister GoM – Ajit Pawar.
Dipen Agrawal, President CAMIT said that trade and industry were already in distress due to worldwide economic slowdown during last two years. Now, the world is going to confront with economy collapse due to COVID-19 Pandemic. In these hard times Indian business enterprises, particularly the Small and Medium Enterprises will be hard hit in short to mid-term. Besides its worrying effects on human life, this pandemic has the capability to slow down the economy. The impact of the same is clearly visible on trade and business. India is among the 15 most affected economies by COVID-19. Demand of goods is vanishing day by day as the number of affected cases are increasing. The situation will turn to worst due to lockdowns announced to prevent India from entering stage 3 of pandemic, he added.
Agrawal listing out the demands raised by CAMIT informed that CAMIT
1) All EMIs including those of term-loans should be extended by 90 days without penal interest or late payment charges and borrower should be saved from adverse rating by CIBIL.
2) Due to forced closure the prescribed working capital conditions cannot be strictly adhered, therefore banks and financial institutions be directed not to take adverse action and relax the conditions related to maintenance of margin against working capital limits obtained to run the businesses for at least 90 days.
3) Extension of payment of Letter of Credit (LC’s) by at-least 90 days without any penal interest against Letter of Assurance from beneficiaries to avoid any mischief and chaos so as to protect the interest of banks as well as business entity.
4) All time bound commitments under Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) such as collections from foreign debtors, export commitments, payment to foreign creditors, etc. which fall due between 15-Mar-2020 to 30-Apr-2020 should be extended by 90 days from their due date.
5) To address the issue of cash flow because of slowdown in collection due to lockdown, in, payment of GST for the month of Feb-2020 to Apr-2020 should be extended by 90 days without any penal interest and GSTIN should allow submission of returns without insisting on payment of GST.
6) All regulatory compliances under substantive laws such as Income Tax, GST, PF, ESIC, Registrar of Companies (ROC) etc. and filling of returns should be extended for 90 days without there being any late fee due.
Dipen Agrawal thanked Prime Minister for constituting an economic response task force named “COIVD 19 Task Force” to be chaired by Finance Minister to engage with all stakeholders, monitor the effect of pandemic on economy and to take all necessary decision to insulate Indian economy from the foreseeable economic turbulence. He expressed confidence that the Task Force following the footsteps of Prime Minister will be proactively on its toes working address the fast changing need of society in these hard times. On behalf of the business community of the state assured extending wholehearted support and co-operation for making all possible efforts to revive the economy once this tough phase passes.
