Government reduces GST rate on 27 items, announces several relief measures for traders and exporters

The GST Council, headed by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley yesterday made a series of announcements on the new tax regime to provide relief to thousands of small business owners and exporters.

This meeting was the result of the discussion which happened between Jaitley, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP President Amit Shah about the economy.

Confirming to reporters, Jaitley said, “GST doesn’t have exemptions, and hence there will be an e-wallet for each exporter with a notional advance refund amount. E-wallet for exporters are expected to be implemented by 1st April 2018, till then they can file GST on the rate of nominal 0.1%.”
Later he also added that ‘starting from October 10, tax refunds of July and August for exporters will be processed’. GST rates of 27 items reviewed by the GST Council, including sliced dry mangoes, khakhra, unbranded namkeen, chapati have been cut to a considerable low rate. E-way bill to be implemented from April 1, said the finance minister – Arun Jaitley.

GST rate on some diesel engine parts, stationery items have been reduced to as low as 18% from a raging 28%.

He also added that a group of Ministers are going to study taxation regime for restaurants. The decision will be taken while keeping the bifurcation on basis of AC and non-AC restaurants in mind.

Jaitley said reverse charge mechanism for transactions between registered and unregistered businesses has been postponed till March 31, 2018.

Limit for composition scheme in GST has been increased from Rs. 75 lakh to Rs. 1 crore so as to reduce compliance burden on medium and small taxpayers, as confirmed by Jaitley.

However, responses of business owners are yet to come on this news and let’s see how the general public reacts to this change.

Stay tuned for more updates from Discountwalas about latest news related to GST.