Krishna Connection

Vijayawada. That is the place chosen for me to begin my career. Everyone would like to work in metros and big cities. That is where the action for IRS lies. Big cases, complicated issues and ingenious chartered accountants collude to sharpen the learning curve. But small towns have their own charm, I was told. If you dispute my terming of Vijayawada as a ‘small town’, all I can say in defense is that small is relative. The last time I referred to Vijayawada as small, the listener broke into a sarcastic laugh. An accomplished bureaucrat who retired as Chief Secretary, he must have felt that I was being snobbish. I can’t blame him much. Even my batchmate in the IAS, who is posted in Eluru, protested instantly at my judgment of urban sizes.

It is characteristic of my service that we don’t begin with places like Rampachodavaram. Atleast not till the Government thinks of taxing collection of honey and sale of wild jackfruits. And that, considering the reluctance to bring agriculture in the ambit of taxes, seems very remote. So for IRS, where a lot of our colleagues start their careers at places like Mumbai and Delhi, Vijayawada is a small place.

So what is it that makes small places charming? It is the people. The day I was to reach here, my train was scheduled to arrive here at 4:45 in the morning. I called the office the previous day and asked if they could send someone to the railway station as I was new to the place and was arriving at an odd hour. In about an hour’s time, I got a call from the driver. I asked him to be at the station by 4:30 in the morning. He said he would be at 4 am. And he was. It was just the beginning. It is ten days since I came here. And I have never come across anyone who thinks twice when you ask him for something. People here respect you to the point of embarrassment.

One reason could be because officers of my rank are few. There are five officers of the rank Assistant / Deputy Commissioners in Vijayawada. The corresponding number in Hyderabad is more than 50. Other could be historical. During my interaction with a senior officer, who hails from this place, I was told the behavior of people towards Government officials is result of the colonial history. Since the region, unlike Hyderabad, was under the colonial rule, the people are well-acquainted with administrative machinery and are more conscious of the power, potential and the reach of Government. This is something which would be put to test soon. How?

My jurisdiction consists mainly of old parts of the city and adjoining rural areas. The economic growth is not very vibrant in these parts. But that doesn’t grant me immunity from upward revision of revenue targets. My predecessor felt that collections have reached optimum levels and are likely to plateau. The only way to increase collection was to widen the tax net. So I have sent about 400 letters to assesses, who were not filing returns to do so. Non-filing of Income-tax returns when you have a taxable income or when you belong to particular class of assesses like companies could lead to imprisonment. The response to these letters would reveal whether the people here are truly respectful of the authority of Government.

Personally what I like the most about small cities is their contribution on the professional front. You get to deal with all types of cases. In big cities, there is an element of specialization in the jurisdiction. Some charges deal with only salary cases, some with business cases and others with companies. However, in small cities, the jurisdiction is territorial. So one gets to deal all kinds of cases and consequently the experience is more varied. Secondly, the workload is relatively more manageable. Not that every colleague of mine in the metros are getting buried under the piles of files, but a few of them do have quite a Herculean task ahead of them. And for me, after two years of slumber at Mussoorie and Nagpur, keeping myself awake when sun is still high is in itself a Herculean task.