Cover Story
GST
Challenges Still Remain For
Compliance of a new Indirect tax system continues to stutter and sputter in
India. As it enters the second year of operation, people are still looking for
clarity and ease of filing returns. The government is, however, confident of
fetching higher revenue and more taxpayers under its net, says M Rajendran
I
ndia’s goods and services tax
(GST) is an outcome of a
successful functioning federal
democracy. It is representative
of every Indian, each political
party and states. Three successive
governments were involved in it -
the NDA conceived it in 2000, the
UPA conceptualised it in 2006, and
NDA implemented it in 2017.
Over the last several years,
all state governments have
communicated the people’s voice
through various committees. And
in the last 12 months, all state
governments have contributed to its
evolution by sitting in the high-
20
Photos: Gireesh GV
powered GST Council meetings.
Chaired by the Union Finance
Minister, the GST Council also has
the Union State Minister of Revenue
or Finance and Ministers In-Charge
of Finance or Taxation of the States.
One year of GST is not just about
Mamta Rajput, an assistant
professor at Delhi University is upset,
as her home budget is hit with high prices after GST. Her apprehension
about GST is more due to lack of clarity on prices, since it was launched
last year. She says, “For at least three months (beginning July 1, 2017) my
vegetable hawker and grocery store vendor hiked prices on the pretext
of GST introduction. At stores, prices marked on the packaged items did
not have GST amount on them, while there was no way to check if the
prices of vegetables and groceries have been impacted by GST.”
Outlook Money July 2018 www.outlookmoney.com