Agenda for GST Council meeting mundane: Punjab FM to Sitharaman

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New Delhi, May 25 (PTI):
Ahead of the GST Council meeting, Congress leader and Punjab Finance Minister Manpreet Badal has written to Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman raising several concerns and seeking timely and comprehensive action on the GST.
In his five-page letter to the finance minister, he said even though the GST Council is meeting after eight months, the agenda for it is “mundane”’ and does not deal with substantive issues that have been raised in the past.
The Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council meeting is scheduled on May 28.
Badal also said that bureaucratic decisions are setting dangerous precedents of subverting the process of law and stressed that the GST Council is a sum total of the Central and State legislatures for the purpose of GST and cannot be short circuited in important decisions.
The Punjab finance minister also highlighted that life-saving items for COVID-19 have Basic Custom Duties of up to 20 per cent and GST of up to 18 per cent, and said they need to be tax free.
“In view of the prevailing position the country finds itself at present, we need to take some urgent measures on the pandemic front.It is baffling that despite the crisis our country currently finds itself in, with millions of people suffering consequences of Covid and inadequate health infrastructure, taxes this high continue to apply on basic essentials needed to overcome this life-threatening disease,” Badal said.
He also raised the issue of GST Implementation Committee bypassing and subverting state laws and said no meaningful prior consultation is held with states while the dispute resolution mechanism is totally missing in the GST.
Badal also raised the issue of extending validity of certain exemption notifications, enactment of new restrictions on availment of tax credits by amending Rule 36 and insertion of rule 86B (payment of minimum tax in cash even while tax credit is available in certain cases) and cancellation and suspension of registration on additional grounds by amendment of Rules 21 and 21A.