12th GST Council Meeting – Highlights & Updates
The 12th GST Council meeting headed by the Finance Minister Arun Jaitely was held on 16th March 2017. The motive of the said meeting was to get the two remaining supplementary bills i.e. SGST and UTGST. The main highlights of the said meeting were as follows.
- The GST bills for the states and the union territories (like Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Lakshadweep, Daman and Diu and Dadra and Nagar Haveli) namely SGST bill and UTGST bill were approved.
- In the 12th GST Council meeting, it was decided by the council that the cess would be levied on five categories of products namely pan masala, chewing tobacco and paan masala, mineral water and aerated drinks, coal and solid fuels made from coal and luxury cars.
While the cess on luxury goods such as luxury cars and aerated drinks would be 15%, the cess on certain goods will be very high. The cap on the tobacco and cigarettes would be 290% or Rs. 4170 per 1000 cigarettes sticks whereas on pan masala the cap would be 135% and the ceiling of the cess on coal and lignite would be 400 per ton. That means for example if you sell 5 tons of coal that have value of 20000 rs. you will have to pay an extra 2000 rs. as cess. GST for the shipment would be 1000 rs at the rate of 5% hence tour total tax liability on 5 tons of coal would be 3000 rs.
- One more important decision made by the council in the said meeting is that there would be Nil rate of tax on supplies sent to Special Economic Zones. That means there would be no tax levied on the goods and services going to Special economic zones and they would be considered as physical exports.
- The committee will discuss and finalise the rules on four issues namely composition scheme rule, valuation of supply of goods and services, transition process for migration to GST regime and input tax credit in the next meeting to be held on 31st march 2017. The committee will also take up any changes if any to the already cleared rules on the five categories.
Source- gstcouncil.gov.in
