Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday chaired a Cabinet meeting which cleared the four bills to be introduced in Parliament for implementing the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime.
“With the Cabinet approval of these four bills, the GST regime in India is in the final stages of culmination and the GST law will most likely be implemented from July 1, 2017,” according to a statement released by the Finance Ministry.
The passage of the four GST-related Bills – the Central Goods and Services Tax (CGST) Bill 2017, the Integrated GST (IGST) Bill 2017, the Union Territory GST Bill 2017 and the GST (Compensation to the States) Bill 2017 – will pave the way for the biggest reform in the area of indirect taxes in the history of independent India, it said. The GST Council had given its nod for the Bills on Friday.
“The timely approval of the Bills by the Cabinet ensures that the industry would have reasonable time to peruse the details of the law impacting them.The GST plan is well on time and July 1 looks realistic,” said Abhishek Rastogi, partner at law firm Khaitan & Co.
He expressed the hope that State Assemblies would also clear the State GST laws soon. The Centre was likely to introduce the bills together in Parliament this week and secure an early passage to meet the proposed July 1 rollout target date for the new indirect tax regime. Separately, States are expected to ratify the State GST Bills approved by the GST Council after getting them passed in the respective Assemblies.
