GST will be biggest reform; govt trying to implement it by July 1: Jaitley

New Delhi, March 22

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Wednesday said that the government was hoping to implement the Goods and Services Tax (GST) by July 1, after the enabling Bills get Parliament nod in the current Budget Session.

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“GST is the biggest reform in India. Hopefully, it will be implemented by July 1. GST Bills will hopefully be cleared in Parliament,” Jaitley said here at the 23rd Conference of Auditors General of Commonwealth Nations hosted by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India.

The Finance Minister also said achieving a growth rate of 7-8 per cent is plausible and if economies pick up globally, then the country’s growth rate can go up further.

Demonetisation, Jaitley said, will act as a disincentive towards continuing to deal with shadow economy, and integration of informal with formal economy will increase the size of the GDP and make it cleaner.

“The biggest taxation reform what we are trying to implement from July 1 is Goods and Services Tax...

“It will increase the volume of taxation, there is no tax on tax and therefore makes goods, commodities and services little cheaper and far more convenient,” Jaitley said.

He said the tax department is trying to make the I-T backbone so strong so that evasion becomes difficult and hence only limited number of cases are taken up for scrutiny.

“The laws which enable this (GST) are now before Parliament which hopefully should get cleared and once they do get cleared then by the middle of this year we hope to see the implementation as far as this law is concerned,” Jaitley said.

Once implemented what is currently the most complicated tax system in the world will become one of the simplest tax system in the world, Jaitley said.

The Union Cabinet this week cleared four supplementary GST legislations which will be introduced in Parliament in the ongoing budget session.

As regards growth, Jaitley said India would continue to remain amongst the fastest growing economies of the world.

“For the last three years we have been the fastest growing major economy, we will continue to be in that phase. I think for India to achieve the growth rate of 7-8 per cent is reasonably logically plausible.

“If big growth returns to the world we probably can push upwards,” — Agencies