Profiteering
If the NAA confirms there is a necessity to apply anti-profiteering measures, it will step in and ask businesses that have not passed on full benefits of a reduced tax burden to consumers to refund it with interest. If the undue benefit cannot be passed on to the recipient, it can be ordered to be deposited in the Consumer Welfare Fund. In rare cases, a profiteering business could lose its GST registration too.
The NAA will be headed by a senior officer of the level of secretary to the central government with four technical members from the centre and states. A selection panel led by cabinet secretary P.K. Sinha has already started consultation with states to finalise the members of the panel.
The finance ministry said this is “one more measure aimed at reassuring consumers that government is fully committed to take all possible steps to ensure the benefits of implementation of GST in terms of lower prices of the goods and services reach them.”
In the 23rd GST Council meeting held in Guwahati last week, the government decided to make major tax cuts, by shifting 177 items from the highest slab of 28% to the 18% slab including wrist watches, non-alcoholic beverages and shaving cream. It also decided to lower the tax rate on 54 other items that includes diabetic food, refined sugar and bamboo furniture.
The top tax rate of 28% is now restricted to luxury and demerit goods like pan masala, aerated water and beverages, cigars and cigarettes, tobacco products, cement, paints, perfumes, airconditioners, dish washing machines, washing machines, refrigerators, vacuum cleaners, cars and two-wheelers, and aircraft and yachts.
Aditya Singhania, Deputy General Manager, GST at Taxmann said the provisions of penalty for making excessive profiteering and even cancellation of registration of such taxpayers will certainly help in achieving the objective of establishing this body. “The measure will certainly keep a check on inflation as it will help in monitoring the prices of the products for which rate cuts have been made,” he added.
In another move, the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) allowed removal of prohibition on export of all types of pulses to ensure that “farmers have greater choice in marketing their produce and in getting better remuneration for their produce”.
In 2016-17, Indian farmers produced 23 million tons of pulses and is the highest ever till date. The government has procured 20 lakh tons of pulses by ensuring minimum support price or market rates, whichever is higher, directly from the farmers and this has been the highest ever procurement of pulses. rise from the past three quarters with the benefits of the changes in the real estate sector bearing fruit,” said Brotin Banerjee, CEO and MD, Tata Housing.
With the changes, the cost of a house will go up but Sriram Kalyanaraman, managing director and CEO of National Housing Bank (NHB), told HT that it would still be affordable for the MIG category.
“In a city like Aurangabad, a person with a salary of Rs 12 lakh can easily get a loan of Rs 40 lakh. With that he can easily afford to buy a house of 1184 sq. ft,” said Kalyanaraman who heads NHB, the regulator for all housing finance companies.
PMAY was initially targeted to benefit those with incomes up to Rs6 lakh a year. Last December, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced expanded its ambit to include the middleclasses till December 2017. But in September, the government extended the scheme for the category to March 2019.
The Union finance ministry had allocated ₹1,000 crore under the programme. The ministry intends to target 50,000 people under the scheme in 2017-18.
“Now we will be able comfortably provide a two-bedroom house in the MIG category, the benefits under the infrastructure category that developers get will be passed on to the homebuyers,” said Pradeep Jain, founder chairman, Parsvnath Group. announced. The “severe” air quality that day was also the worst for Delhi this season.
According to Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) data, the level of particulate matter, which was since November 12, began to shoot back up early Thursday.
Delhi Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal approved the lifting of the weeklong emergency measures, barring the one on construction because the matter is listed for hearing at the NGT on Friday. Respective agencies also issues notifications announcing the withdrawal of the emergency steps.
EPCA chairperson Bhure Lal told the chief secretaries of Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and Haryana that the parking fee hike was being lifted due to “lack of enforcement” and the absence of an adequate public transport system. He also ordered the lifting of a ban on hot mix plants.
Earlier in the day, the city’s pollution woes also resonated in the Delhi High Court which asked the local government, the CPCB and Delhi Pollution Control Committee to clarify how they intended to spend money collected as green cess and other similar funds to mitigate air pollution in the capital.
“We want to know what is being done with the funds,” said a bench of Justice S Ravindra Bhat and Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva after senior advocate Kailash Vasudev, who is assisting the court as amicus curiae, submitted that over Rs700 crore were collected as green cess from sale of cars of 2000 cc or more engine capacity.
Meanwhile, a report from the government-run System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and Research (SAFAR) said dust storms from Iraq, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia were the main reason behind the week-long smog in Delhi that started on November 7.
On November 8, when the AQI was an alarming 478, SAFAR said the contribution of dust storms from West Asia and the Gulf region was as much as 40%, whereas that of stubble burning was 25%. The rest was from local factors such as vehicular pollution.