Union Finance Ministrer Arun Jaitley on Saturday said the proposed Goods & Services Tax (GST) will be a simplified taxation system which will “eradicate miseries being faced by the trading community” at present and “end the cobweb of various taxes levied at different stages from production to distribution.”
It will also bring an end to multiple-authority taxation regime, the Minister told a delegation of the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) here.
The delegation, led by its national secretary general Praveen Khandelwal, met the Minister at his residence in New Delhi, according to a statement by CAIT. The delegation demanded that the government reconsider the proposed levy of 1 per cent additional tax on inter-State transactions over and above the GST aimed at compensating producer States for the revenue losses post the shift to the new tax.
“It will have a cascading effect since traders will not be able to obtain input tax credit on it,” the statement said.
The delegation sought that the GST rate itself be pegged at a reasonable level.
“We have apprised the Finance Minister of our apprehensions and he has assured us that he will look into it,” the statement said, quoting Mr. Khandelwal.
Memorandum on GST The delegation presented a memorandum on the proposed GST to Mr. Jaitley urging the government to bifurcate the tax between the Central and the State governments through computerised systems so that traders did not have to deal with multiple tax authorities.
Mr. Jaitley told the delegation that “once the GST Bill is passed by Parliament and subsequently by State legislatures, separate Bills for CGST and IGST will need to be passed by Parliament and SGST Bill will be passed by State legislatures and at that time the stakeholders will be consulted and their apprehensions will be suitably addressed,” the release said.
