NE BUSINESS BUREAU
HYDERABAD, SEP. 28
The Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime is against India’s federal structure and states have very little say on the decision as against some of the advanced countries such as USA, Palanivel Thiagarajan and K N Balagopal, Finance Ministers of Tamil Nadu and Kerala, respectively said on Wednesday.
Blaming the Center for collecting indirect taxes in the name of cess and not sharing it with the states, Thiagarajan said the ratio of cess as of the total taxation has gone up 110 percent to 124 percent in recent times.
வளர்ந்த நாடுகளைப் போல அரசின் திட்டங்கள்,சலுகைகள் சரியான பயனாளிகளுக்கு கொண்டு சேர்ப்பதற்கான திட்டங்கள், வருவாயை பெருக்குவதற்கான சீர்திருத்தங்கள், மறைமுக வரி எவ்வாறு ஏற்றத்தாழ்வை அதிகரிக்க கூடியதாக உள்ளது ஆகியவற்றை @galattadotcom நேர்காணலில் எடுத்துரைத்தேன்
https://t.co/qw9BNKagF1— Dr P Thiaga Rajan (PTR) (@ptrmadurai) September 29, 2021
“For somebody who came into politics about five years ago, it strikes me fast as to how shaky the system (GST regime) is for something that is supposed to serve a country of billion and almost 400 million people…
You put all of the pieces together, one thing that is very clear to me is the fear of loss of autonomy (of states) has been fully realized,” the Tamil Nadu minister said in South India GST Conclave – an online interaction with the Ministers of Southern States, organised by FICCI.
He said he had already voiced his concerns on how the states are losing “flexibility or freedom” on taxation issues.
According to him, GST was not designed to tackle systemic risks or pandemic type issues.
The Kerala Minister said that prior to the GST regime, his state had an income growth of 14 to 16 percent every year. After the introduction of the new tax system, there was stagnation in the initial two years and then there was a negative growth due to the pandemic situation.
He said he and CPI leader D Raja vehemently opposed the introduction of GST in the country and made a dissent note in the Parliamentary Committee concerned.
“The GST is very much against the principles of federalism. I said (then) that true federalism will be (negatively) affected up after the introduction of the GST,” Balagopal said.
Stating that Kerala is collecting less tax on Diesel as against the Centre, the minister said the Union Government is collecting Rs 31 on diesel in the name of Cess, which is not being shared with states through devolution of funds.
Murugesh Nirani, Karnataka Minister for Industries said though there is a long way to go in the implementation of GST, the system was introduced as part of One Country-One Tax model being adopted by the NDA Government.
