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Rajya Sabha to take up GST next week
The stage is set for the Rajya Sabha taking up the much-awaited Goods and Services Tax Bill next week as several major parties outside the ruling NDA have pledged support to the crucial tax reform.
​New Delhi: The stage is set for the Rajya Sabha taking up the much-awaited Goods and Services Tax Bill next week as several major parties outside the ruling NDA have pledged support to the crucial tax reform.
MoS for Parliamentary Affairs Mukhtat Abbas Naqvi has said in the Rajya Sabha that the GST Bill is listed for discussion and passage in the coming week.
While the Congress has softened its stand agreeing to a formula put forth by the government during inter-party discussions over the last few days, it is still to reveal its mind on the government’s stand that the structure of the proposed GST Council won’t be altered to give more power to states.
Reports say that the Empowered Committee of State Finance Ministers, which is slated to meet on Monday here, is likely to finalise the structure of the tax. Moreover, the Union Cabinet will likely to vet some changes in the bill before it is put to vote in the Upper House.
Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has already indicated that the government would press for the passage of the bill next week.
In the Rajya Sabha, the NDA has only 72 members. To sail through the Upper House, for the Constitution Amendment Bill, two-thirds of the members should vote in its favour.
Several major non-NDA parties like Samajwadi Party, NCP, JD(U), CPI(M), TMC, BJD and others have inclined to support the bill. The government wants to pass the GST bill even without the support of Congress which has 60 MPs.
On the other hand, the BSP, which had earlier backed the bill, has now voiced its opposition after Dalit issue in Gujarat. Also, Jayalalithaa’s AIADMK has remained wary of GST despite the Centre reaching out to the party several times.
The Congress, which originally mooted the GST in 2009 to replace all indirect taxes, has been demanding that the overall rate be capped at 18 per cent and scrapping of an additional 1 per cent tax designed to compensate manufacturing states that fear losing revenue.
MoS for Finance Arjun Ram Meghwal said that when the Congress drafted the GST bill, it did not cap the GST rate in the Constitutional amendment bill and their demand now is only an afterthought. “We think we will reach a solution soon. The government is making a lot of effort to build consensus,” he said.
"The government is making a lot of effort to build consensus on GST Bill. There are many Chief Ministers - UP, Odisha, West Bengal, Bihar - they all want GST to come fast... We hope that Rajya Sabha will be able to pass the GST Bill in the next or third week of (monsoon session of) Parliament," said Meghwal.
