Tirupur Exporters Association (TEA) today urged the Centre to expedite release of pending Rebate on State Levies (ROSL), amounting to over Rs.2,600 crore for the last nine months.

ROSL has been pending for most of the garment exporting units and only a few units got the amount partially till December, TEA President, Raja M Shanmugham said in a statement.

The total ROSL amount for All India Ready made Garment Exports (Woven and Knitwear) estimated for the period September 20 last year
to June 20 this year was Rs.3,025 Crore and of this, only Rs.400 Crore has been disbursed so far with rs.2,625 crore in arrears, he said.

Tirupur exporting units alone have to get about Rs.550 Crore, he said.

Though Rs.1,555 crores were allotted for ROSL claim in 2017-18 Union budget, till date it has not been disbursed and representations have been made to various ministers and offices, including Finance and Textile Ministers to help for releasing the ROSL pending claim, he said.

The Textile Ministry has announced RoSL in lieu of Value Added Tax on the occasion of releasing special package for apparel sector and the scheme came into effect from September 20 last year.

As per the scheme, the central Government had taken into consideration of all the taxes paid by the exporters like VAT, Electricity duty, Octroi, entry tax, and it is to be noted that some of the taxes like electricity duty, octroi and entry tax were not being refunded earlier to the exporters, he said.

The ROSL rate for the garment items exported varies from 2.65 per cent to 3.9 per cent, Shanmugham said