Finance Minister Dr. Haseeb A Drabu today launched the first ever e-stamping facility in Srinagar thus making the J&K 21ststate in India to do the same.The Finance Minister launched the facility at J&K Bank Solina in presence of Commissioner Commercial Taxes and other officials.Dr. Drabu said that it will go a long way in easing the mode of doing transactions in the state. The e-stamping counter at Solina is first of its kind in the entire state.The Finance Minister later took stock of functioning of the Commercial Taxes Department during a review meeting.The meeting was informed that the e-stamping would not only help the clients but will also check leakage of government revenue and make entire process free from any kind of fraud.
The Finance Minister said that main motive of any kind of IT intervention should be to reduce the level of government intervention. “With online facilities a trader should be able to do the same work quickly and without having to visit government offices or meeting many officials,” said Dr Drabu.Commissioner Commercial Tax Baseer Ahmad Khan informed the Minister that the department is going to roll out 63 more e-stamping facilities in Kashmir division within the next two to three months.Stock Holding Corporation of India (SHCI) is the consultant of the e-stamping facility in the state. An agreement was signed with SHCI on 08 January 2014.e-stamping is a computer based application and secured way of paying non-judicial stamp duty to the government through a highly secured and tamper proof certificate and a Unique Identification Number (UIN). Anybody having the UIN can check the authenticity of the certificate through www.shcilestamp.com 24X7.Under the e-stamping the client can approach Authorised Collection Centre (ACC) for the purchase of e-stamps certificates and remit applicable stamp duty. ACC enters the details in the e-stamping system and print the stamp certificate after all the consistency checks are done and the money is accounted for.