Road to success of e-way bill is likely to be a long and bumpy one

Some of the transporters were not open on April 1, the day the e-way bill was rolled out

A journey with a trucker has brought home the point that a road to success of e-way bill is long and bumpy. If one thought that there would be no checking once e-way bill kicks in, he must have been doing a wishful thinking. So far as queues on check posts are concerned, those have no longer been there since July when the goods and services tax (GST) was rolled out.
 
In fact, some of the transporters did not open their shops on April one. Since financial year 2017-18 ended just a day before and April 1 being a Sunday, these transporters were not willing to move their vehicles.

 
"We will get to know the impact of e-way bill on Monday," said an executive at a Delhi-based logistics firm, who had earlier promised to help Business Standard journalists board his trucks to gauge the impact of the e-way rollout. The plan did not work out as they were among few goods transport agencies who had shut shop on Sunday.
 

However, for some, like Om Logistics, it was business as usual. So, this correspondent decided to accompany one of its truckers carrying goods to Uttarakhand via Uttar Pradesh.
 
At the warehouse of Om Logistics in Dilshad Garden - near the Delhi border touching Uttar Pradesh - Manjeet, an employee, was busy generating e-way bills for around dozens of trucks that are bound to leave for the neighbouring states of Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Uttarakhand.

 
Inside the office, there are various guidelines and notices related to e-way bill put up by the logistics firm on the wall. "Kindly ensure that the e-way bill is generated before loading the goods," read one of them.
 
Though e-way bill will increase the work load for Manjeet, who now has to generate challan for each consignment above value of Rs 50,000 to be transported, it is expected to make life easier for the transporter who does not have to stop at checkpoints and generate challan while crossing the state border.
 
The e-way bill is expected to reduce the inspection and hence the travel time for goods transportation, Manjeet said.

 
Manjeet took a print out of all the bills that he had generated from the e-way bill portal. "Sales tax officers will still ask for it. Though we have read that printout of e-way bill is not necessary but we want to be on the safer side," he said.
 
Transporters are still so accustomed to the previous indirect tax regime that they continue to refer to tax officers as sales tax officers.
 
Manjeet handed over a clutch of documents to driver Amit who needed to transport the goods to the firm's warehouse based in Rudrapur - approximately 250 kilometres away from Delhi.

 
Under e-way bill regime, transporters need not carry the physical bills and may also produce these documents in digital form stored on mobile phones.
 
The truck left at midnight and barely 200 minutes after the start of the journey, a tax official stopped the vehicle to examine the required documents. After having a careful look at the documents, the officer gave his nod for the driver to proceed  to  his journey.
 
Not much has changed even after the introduction of GST last July, Amit said, referring to the regular inspections on road, while listening to songs on his smartphone.

 
Amit, who has been plying on the Delhi-Uttarakhand route for 12 years now, also continuted to refer to the inspectors as sales tax officers.
 
"Earlier, it would take a lot of time at the border to get the challan of the goods that we carried. It used to be a major headache for us. At least that doesn't happen now," said Amit, while driving the truck all throughout the journey at an average speed of 40 kilometers per hour.
 
He said even after the rollout of GST, the tax officers have been examining the documents at three-four points during the journey to Rudrapur, especially at Moradabad and Rampur in Uttar Pradesh.

 
The major bottlenecks for the transporters are long waiting time at toll plaza even as checkpoints have been removed after GST. The truck had to wait at a toll plaza in Uttar Pradesh for at least half an hour. The second major hurdle on this route was the poor conditions of road and the poorly-lit highways that increases the transit time.
 
The truck had a free run until we were about to enter Rudrapur when the vehicle was again halted outside one regional tax office.
 
When a frustrated Amit asked the official why is there a need to stop the vehicle despite all the e-way bills, the latter quipped," Not stopping a vehicle is a far bigger crime."

 
The official took Amit inside the office, enquired him about the goods, took a few photocopies of the bills and let him go. This was when e-way bills are supposed to be online pieces of information. According to M S Mani, partner with Deloitte India, the officer concrened has to report it back to the portal once he stops a vehicle for checking e-way bill.
 
"What has changed you tell me?" Amit asked me as we enter Rudrapur to end our over six-hour long journey.
 
Route
 
Dilshad Garden (Delhi)-Hapur (UP)-Moradabad (UP)-Rampur (UP)-Rudrapur (Uttarakhand)
 
Distance: 250 km approx

 
Time taken by bus: 4.5 hours
Time taken by truck: Over 6 hours