FTK's wish list for Budget 2009

Bangalore: FTK, a developer of Indian languages word processor software products, data entry software and online solutions has come up with its wish list for the Budget 2009. The wish list laid emphasis on the education sector and uniformity of taxation on packaged software.

Rafi Palgi, FTK Executive Manager at FTK Technologies said, "First and foremost, a further increase in our budget outlay for education in general should be considered, as some long-standing and yet unresolved problems still persist. There is also a case for improving the quality of education imparted in the case of government-run schools and colleges." He added that the students should graduate with a minimum level of computer skill that would help them to compete in the job market.

According to Palgi, the government should help educational institutions to acquire proper infrastructure in imparting computer education to students. The infrastructure could include computer hardware, software, bandwidth, faculty, and many more.

"In order to help the software industry help the education sector there should be further cut in the excise duty from currently 12 percent to 8 percent," said Palgi. By abolishing the double taxation system prevailing on the packaged software (including both service tax and excise duty), the overall price of the software would be cheaper and it would be a "help to the software industry".

When software is downloaded from the internet, it is subjected to service tax. The State Governments also levy a VAT on software. Also, the packaged software attracts excise duty or countervailing duty (CVD). Since there are various modes of delivery of software, licenses and various kinds of software, there is no clarity on the exact taxes to be levied. "Hence, there should be clarity whether software would take in excise duty or service tax, as the same item cannot attract both excise duty and the service tax."