GST Council meet today: 5 things to watch out for

NEW DELHI: he 27th meeting of the GST Council on Thursday will consider a number of issues which have been in the pipeline for some time now. The Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley-chaired council, comprising state finance ministers, will meet through video conferencing. The meeting comes at a time when Goods and Services Tax (GST) collections achieved its record high by exceeding Rs 1 lakh crore milestone in April.

Here are five major issues that will be on the Council's agenda:

1) NEW RETURN FORMS: It has been hanging fire for a long time and a Group of Ministers (GOM) under Bihar deputy CM Sushil Modi could not get revenue officers and Infosys chairman Nandan Nilekani, who is being consulted on the issue, to agree to a simplified form. Now, the GST Council will decide on the "fusion model" proposed by Sushil Modi

2) DISCOUNT ON DIGITAL PAYMENTS: If the proposal, which has been on the table since November goes through, payment by credit card will fetch you a discount on the GST liability, which may be to the tune of two percentage points

  

3) FUTURE OF GST NETWORK (GSTN): The Centre and the states will decide if GSTN, the company that runs the IT platform, needs to be turned into a 100% government-owned company at a time when there is debate over data security. Currently, HDFC, ICICI Bank and LIC Housing Finance are majority owners.

4) REVERSE CHARGE MECHANISM: The anti-evasion tool is meant to keep tabs on sale by businesses, which have a turnover of less than Rs20 lakh and do not need to register for GST.

5) CESS ON SUGAR: A contentious issue, given that the idea was to do away with cesses and surcharges after the new regime kicked in. The ill-conceived plan has been proposed by the food ministry.

Source::: Times of India, dated 04/05/2018.