As the April 2010 deadline for the goods and services
tax (GST) inches closer, the empowered group of state
finance ministers plans to meet Finance Minister Pranab
Mukherjee on January 7 next year to brief him about the
progress on preparing a roadmap for GST and sort out the
issues.
“For certain difficulties that were reported to us, it
would be tough to introduce the Bill for GST in this
winter session (of Parliament). The finance minister has
said he is willing to discuss with us in January after
this Parliament session is over,” Asim Dasgupta,
chairman of the empowered group and finance minister of
West Bengal, told reporters after a meeting of the
committee today.
Dasgupta said that after their proposed meeting with
Mukherjee, they would be able to take a decision on
Constitutional amendment and other preparations related
to the introduction of the tax regime.
The meeting with Mukherjee will be preceded by a
discussion with a taskforce of the 13th Finance
Commission and economic think-tank National Institute of
Public Finance and Policy (NIPFP), which released two
separate reports on GST.
The empowered committee discussed the views of the
states on GST. In the meeting on January 7, which could
be rolled over to January 8 if some issues remain
unresolved, will have presentations from the
representatives of the Finance Commission and NIPFP on
their reports on GST. Commenting on the recommendation
of the Finance Commission task force, Dasgupta said: “We
have taken a note of it. We will consider it among the
other proposals from industry, trade etc.”
The report of the task force, led by Arbind Modi, has
suggested a central GST of 5 per cent and state GST of 7
per cent. It also recommended the new tax regime should
be deferred by six months, from April 1 to October 1,
2010.
It also said dealers in high value goods comprising
gold, silver and platinum ornaments, precious stones and
bullion should be allowed to opt for the compounded levy
of 1 per cent each without the ceiling of Rs 40 lakh,
since high value goods “are prone to smuggling due to
high tax incidence”.
A state finance minister said if the April deadline was
missed, which is “likely because the process of
constitutional amendment and clearing of Bills would
take at least four months”, implementation of GST would
have to be deferred till next year, as introducing it in
the middle of year could create problems.
