If an important department — Trade and Taxes — of the Delhi Government loses crucial data in case of a technical glitch or attack by hackers, it will draw a blank in its bid to recover because no backup exists for the same. Given the circumstances, the department has asked the Information Technology (IT) Department to provide alternative backup site or disaster recovery site (DRS) to store financial data of the national Capital. This data has huge financial as well as legal implications. If the main server of this database crashes, there is no effective arrangement to retrieve it immediately. Currently, all data of the Sales Tax Department (known as Trade and Taxes Department) has been stored in NIC servers at laxmi Nagar, Shastri Park and Trade and Taxes Department office in the national Capital.
Taking serious note, Commissioner (Trade and Taxes) Prashant Goyal has written a letter to the Secretary of IT Department that the database of entire Value Added Tax (VAT) stored at its Shastri Park and laxmi Nagar offices are highly vulnerable. “The department is actively involved in automation of all its key processes such as Return Filing, Assessment, Refund, Registration, Amendment and Cancellation. Consequently, large volume of critical data is collected and stored at the offices of the trade and taxes, laxmi Nagar and, Shastri Park. If the main server of this data base crashes, there is no effective arrangement to retrieve it immediately,” Goyal said in a letter.
Therefore, he has requested to create a database centre in Pune where the team of IT experts is required immediately. Keeping in view the urgency of this matter, he has requested that a team of expert IT professional should be deployed in Pune immediately to make the new arrangement operational.
The Trade and Taxes Commissioner has argued that entire trading community is utilising DVAT servers and it is in the larger interest of this entire trading community to keep their confidence intact by making this kind of arrangement of separate database centre.
As Delhi falls in high seismic zones, there is strong possibility and during any natural calamity, this database may get lost causing huge problem to the Sales Tax Department. This department alone earns Rs30,000 crore revenue per annum and it gives highest revenue to the Delhi Government.
In his letter, Goyal has pointed out that huge data of trade and taxes department has financial as well as legal implications.
Citing this reason, the VAT Department is seeking separate office in Pune for the storage of this data which is outside the periphery of Delhi.
The Sales Tax Department is of the view that Delhi based data also face threat from hackers. The VAT data is significant due to the fact that it contains details of entire VAT collected during the year and also about the returns being given to the VAT depositors. The entire operation is sensitive.
The Sales Tax Commissioner had conveyed his anxiety on this score in the past also. But the sales tax commissioner is adamant that computer based data base must be stored at a safer place at the earliest. In this initiative, he is seeking the support of the IT secretary to revamp the system at the earliest.