(FE)
The Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council could bring down the tax rate on as many as 140 items from the highest slab of 28% as it meets in Guwahati on Friday, leaving only 40-odd items in this category, according to government officials. The items most likely to see a lower rate include sanitaryware, detergents, furniture, electrical switches, and plastic and ceramic pipes, among others. The council will deliberate on a key proposal made by a group of state finance ministers (GoM) which called for allowing all taxpayers to file returns quarterly even as they pay taxes on a monthly basis. At the last meeting, the council had decided to allow taxpayers below the Rs 1.5-crore revenue threshold to file returns quarterly. This covered nearly 90% of all taxpayers registered on the GST Network portal.
The council had in May fixed 28% rate for nearly 230 items out of a total 1,211 items under GST on the basis of recommendations by a rate fitment committee. In subsequent meetings, it has cut rates on nearly 100 items including 47 in the 28% category. The fitment committee had followed a principle of equivalence in fixing rates, which means that items fell under the GST slabs (0%, 5%, 12%, 18% and 28%) nearest to the pre-GST tax incidence. Hinting at the overhaul in GST rates, Bihar deputy chief minister Sushil Modi on Wednesday said that the council could prune rates of nearly 80% of the items in the highest slab. Earlier this week, Union finance minister Arun Jaitley had said that some of the goods in the highest slab shouldn’t have been there in the first place. Besides, the council is also likely to prune rates of some items in the 18% slab.
