Assembly ratifies GST Bill in BJP MLAs’ absence

NEW DELHI: The Delhi Assembly ratified the Good and Services Tax (GST) Bill on Wednesday, though ruling party legislators raised “concerns” about the regulations that the Centre will form to implement the new indirect tax regime.

BJP legislators, including the leader of Opposition, were absent from the House when the house ratified the Bill, passed by both Houses of Parliament.

There are three BJP MLAs in the 70-member Assembly — leader of Opposition, Vijender Gupta and MLA Jagdish Pradhan earlier walked out of the House alleging the Delhi government was “running away from tabling the CAG report”. BJP MLA Om Prakash Sharma is under suspension.

Deputy chief minister, Manish Sisodia, underlined that the Bill “placed Delhi (UT with a state legislature) on equal footing to that of a State”.

The GST Bill, tipped to be India’s biggest tax reform, has to be ratified by at least 15 out of the 29 state legislatures before the President can notify the GST Council. The council will eventually fix the new tax rate and other issues related to the implementation of the new tax regime. The Centre has set a deadline of April 2017 for its rollout.

“This is the biggest tax reform in the history of country. With the GST, our share in taxes would grow…Delhi is essentially known as services state (in terms of economic activities). Till now despite contributingheavilyintermsof tax collection,thecentralshareof taxes has stuck at `325 crore for past 17 years,” said Sisodia, while tabling the resolution to ratify the Bill.

Sisodia, also Delhi’s finance minister, and other ruling party legislators said issues such as fixing of annual turnover for mandatory registration of trade and businesses (current threshold is 20 lakh for mandatory registration under VAT), fixing of tax rates, annual turnover limits for separation of penal action between the Centre and the state governments and the impact of the new regime on consumers in terms of inflation were concerns.

‘CENTRE CONFUSED

OVER DELHI’S STATUS’ Sisodia also hit out at the Centre for being “confused” over the constitutional status of Delhi. “The central government is confused over the status of Delhi — whether to call it State or UT. Earlier, in centrally sponsored schemes, share of central government used to be 80% and in some case even 100%. But in a memorandum issued on August 17 by Niti Ayog, they have reduced it to 60% in core of the core scheme and 50% in general scheme. The central government should explain where the money is going. States are being forced to adopt schemes,” said Sisodia.