All efforts made to meet April 1 deadline for GST roll out: FinMin

After the reports about the government likely to miss April 1 deadline for implementation of Goods and Service Tax bill, the Ministry of Finance on Wednesday said that all efforts are being made to meet the necessary deadlines.

The Ministry released a "report card" on GST implementation. It said that at present, agenda items pertaining to ‘GST related draft laws’ and ‘Provisions for cross empowerment to ensure single interface under GST’ are under consideration of the GST Council. 

The release said that since notification of the GST Council on September 12, six meetings of the Council have been held till now. 

"During these meetings, number of important decisions have been taken paving way for roll out of GST with effect from 1st April 2017," the Ministry said.

Some of the important decisions taken in the last six Meetings of the GST Council are:

• The threshold limit for exemption from levy of GST would be Rs.20 lakhs for normal States (Rs.10 lakhs for the Special Category States enumerated in Article 279A of the Constitution).
• The threshold for availing the Composition scheme would be Rs.50 lakhs. Service providers would be kept out of the Composition scheme.
• To compensate States for 5 years for loss of revenue due to implementation of GST, the base year for the revenue of the State would be 2015-16 and a fixed growth rate of 14% will be applied to it.
• Approval of the Draft GST Rules on Registration; Payment; Return; Refund and Invoice, Debit & Credit Notes with the understanding that minor changes may be permitted with the approval of the Chairperson, if required, due to suggestions from the stakeholders or from the Law Department.
• All entities exempted from payment of indirect tax under any existing tax incentive scheme would pay tax in the GST regime and the decision to continue with any incentive scheme shall be with the concerned State or Central Government. In case any State Government or Central Government decides to continue any existing exemption/incentive scheme, it will be administered by way of a reimbursement mechanism.
• Bands of rates of goods under GST shall be 5%, 12%, 18% and 28% and in addition there would be a category of exempt goods. Further, a cess would be levied on certain goods such as luxury cars, aerated drinks, pan masala and tobacco products, over and above the rate of 28% for payment of compensation to the States.