Rajya Sabha panel on GST has 1st meeting

Briefed by revenue secretary, will visit some states, meet experts later this month

A Rajya Sabha committee on the constitutional amendment  Bill regarding a national goods and services tax (GST) met on Friday and heard Revenue Secretary Shaktikanta Das.

It also decided to tour some states to talk to other stakeholders and experts.

The committee is likely to call experts such as Vijay Kelkar, Y V Reddy, Govinda Rao and Sumit Dutt Majumdar at its next meeting this month, sources said.

Das explained in detail the differences between the Bill  brought by the present government and its predecessor; the latter had already been examined by the standing committee on finance.

Some of the differences include the way petroleum is to be treated in the proposed  regime. While the 2011 Bill sought to keep it out of GST,  the new one seeks to include  it  in the indirect tax regime,  even as the new tax will not be levied on it.

While states would continue to impose value-added tax on petroleum, the Centre would levy excise duty till the time the proposed GST Council decides on a rate. Then, the previous Bill had a provision that the council would take decisions through a consensus. The new one says decisions will be arrived at by a three-fourth majority.

Later, the revenue secretary tweeted, “We are working overtime to introduce GST from April 1, 2016.”

Committee members by consensus decided on meeting state representatives as “they are the main stakeholders”.

The panel is headed by the Bharatiya Janata Party's Bhupender Yadav. It seems likely to go to Chennai, Kolkata, Bengaluru and Mumbai. At each city, representatives from neighbouring states will be called to put across their views.

A committee member said Tamil Nadu openly opposes the GST, while Gujarat continues to be problematic.  

He said the Nationalist Congress Party’s Praful Patel sought to stay away from discussions when tobacco is taken up. Patel’s family owns CeeJay Group, one of the country’s biggest bidi and tobacco-derivative businesses.

During the second round, the committee will invite Vijay Kelkar, chairman of the 13th Finance Commission; Y V reddy, chairman of the 14th one and also ex-chief of the Reserve Bank of India, former Central Board of Excise and Customs chairman Sumit Majumdar, and former National Institute of Public Finance and Policy head, Govind Rao.

Business chambers would be called in another round. Once these discussions are through, the committee will take up clause by clause discussion of the bill. The 21-member panel has been asked to give its  report by the last day of the first week of the next session of Parliament.