A Primer on Proposed Tax System on Goods and Services Part-I: Basic Concept and Framework

By CA. Pradip R Shah

Introduction:

With the release of the First Discussion Paper (FDP) by the Empowered Committee (EC) on the proposed Goods and Services Tax (GST), the country is moving into an era of major tax reform in the arena of indirect taxes. Looking to the title of the paper one would have expected a thread-bare analysis on various aspects of the proposed tax system.

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GST in India

Dr. Sanjiv Agarwal

So far, VAT at the state or Cenvat at the central level, along with services tax, have been major steps in tax reforms. Before the present tax regime, there was the sales tax regime, where there was a cascading effect on tax. VAT has removed this burden, but it had deficiencies. The Cenvat load remains. There were several state taxes which were not subsumed in any one tax. The inter-state sales tax or CST was not fully relieved. 

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IGST – Innovative way of handling Inter State Transactions

CA Hiral Raja

The Empowered Committee of State Finance Ministers unveiled the First Discussion paper on Goods and Service Tax in India on 10th November 2009. This discussion paper provides us with broad contours of dual GST to be implemented in India.

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Centre in favour of single rate of CGST, SGST and uniform registration system linked to PAN

As is now well known, the Empowered Committee of State Finance Minister (EC) had, in November 2009, issued a First Discussion Paper (Paper) on the dual Goods and Service Tax (GST). This paper had set out the EC’s views on the nature of the dual GST, its coverage, the manner of its applicability, its coverage and on several other design aspects of the GST as well, including on treatment of inter-state supplies of goods and services.

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Comments of the Department of Revenue (DoR) on the First Discussion Paper on GST

Introduction: “GST”, commonly known as Goods and Service Tax has now become the buzz word of the industry as a whole. Any news, views or comments on this topic influences the industry at large and when the comments are from the Department of Revenue the impact is surely gigantic. Recently, the Department of Revenue has released its comments on the First Discussion Paper on GST.

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Frequently Asked Questions and Answers on Goods and Service Tax (GST)

Question 1 : What is the justification of GST ?

Answer : There was a burden of “tax on tax” in the pre-existing Central excise duty of the Government of India and sales tax system of the State Governments. The introduction of Central VAT (CENVAT) has removed the cascading burden of “tax on tax” to a good extent by providing a mechanism of “set off” for tax paid on inputs and services upto the stage of production, and has been an improvement over the pre-existing Central excise duty. Similarly, the introduction of VAT in the States has removed the cascading effect by giving set-off for tax paid on inputs as well as tax paid on previous purchases and has again been an improvement over the previous sales tax regime.

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