New Delhi: Government will bring the much-awaited GST Bill, which provides for a uniform indirect tax structure, in the current session of Parliament, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said on November 27.
He also said the Direct Taxes Code (DTC) was under the consideration of the government but did not say when it would be brought to Parliament. Replying to a debate on black money in the Lok Sabha, he said the meeting of the Empowered Committee of State Finance Ministers on the Goods and Services Tax will be called soon.
"As far as GST is concerned we have arrived at broad consensus, there are some issues. The next meeting of the Empowered Committee has been called very shortly," he said. He, however, did not elaborate on the pending issues. "I am confident that we will try and arrive at a consensus and possibly introduce Bill in this session itself. That's my endeavour and I hope I succeed," Jaitley said.
The government proposes to implement GST from April 1, 2016, and the new Finance Commission may be set up ahead of its schedule to look into the issues related with the new indirect tax regime. The GST aims at subsuming most of the indirect taxes at the central as well as state level. On the DTC, the Finance Minister said the code was drafted by the previous UPA government and is under consideration of this government.
"DTC is under our consideration," he said. DTC proposes to overhaul of the six-decade old Income Tax Act in its present shape and make tax system simpler. The draft DTC has undergone many changes since being first proposed by the then Finance Minister P Chidambaram in 2009.
A Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance made further changes and suggested income brackets of Rs 3-10 lakh, Rs 10-20 lakh and Rs 20 lakh and above that should be taxed at 10, 20 and 30 per cent respectively. On corporate tax, it recommended that the rate be retained at 30 per cent.
