1st GST Council Meeting – Highlights & Updates

1st GST Council Meeting – Highlights & Updates

• Scheduled Implementation

A timetable was proposed for completing various steps in order to implement GST by 1 st April 2017. He stated that the Draft IGST, CGST and SGST Laws and Rules, GST Rate Structure and Exemption Lists would be recommended by the Council by end of November 2016. The CGST and lGST Acts would need to be passed by December 2016 by the parliament, and the SGST Acts by the respective State Legislatures in the Winter Session of 2016.if need be, the Winter Sessions would be postponed to December 2016.

• Following discussions remained inconclusive

Traders/manufacturers of goods with a turnover of less than Rs. 1.5 crores to be under the jurisdiction of the State administration.

The traders/manufacturers of goods with a turnover above Rs. 1.5 crores to be administered by both the Central and State tax administrations on the basis of the cross-empowerment model presented in the meeting subject to modification.

All existing registered service providers irrespective of the value of turnover, for the present, shall continue to be administered by the Central tax administration. States will also get jurisdiction along with the Centre over those service providers who get registered under GST in future and a protocol in this regard could be devised. Specific arrangements for the training of State Government officers in the assessment of Service Tax to be made.

The percentage of audit in all cases would be restricted to 5% of total assesses.

Information-based enforcement powers to be exercised by the Central Government or State Government in all cases irrespective of division.

•  Thresholds for exemption and composition under GST 

Composition threshold shall be Rs. 50 lakhs whereas the exemption threshold to be 20 lakhs rupees.

• Modalities for GST Compensation and draft Compensation Law 

After numerous rounds of discussion, the meeting concluded with following points:-

(i) 2015-16 shall be taken as the base year for compensation.

(ii) Compensated revenue shall consist of all taxes (including cesses) levied by the States and also the ones which are now proposed to be subsumed in GST.

(iii) Compensation may be released quarterly against the figures given by the Central Accounting authority tentatively and final adjustment can be done after getting the accounts of the year audited.

Source- https://www.gstcouncil.gov.in/1st-gst-council-meeting