Govt reduces its share of GST from regional movie tickets

KOLKATA: The state government has decided to maintain the usual 2 percent tax on tickets of regional movies by waving a percentage of its share in the Goods and Services Tax (GST).

Amit Mitra, the state Finance minister, said: “It was initially decided to impose 28 percent GST on movie tickets. We had fought in the GST council and made them to bring it down to 18 percent for the tickets worth below Rs 100.

Out of it, the state’s share is 9 percent. The state government has decided to waive 7 per cent of its 9 percent share. As a result, only 2 percent tax will be imposed on movie tickets below Rs 100.

It may be mentioned that in the present tax regime, the state charges only 2 percent entertainment tax on movie tickets. Thus, one doesn’t have to bear any additional tax for the state government to buy a movie ticket.”

He further said: “For tickets worth more than Rs 100, the GST is 28 percent with a state’s share of 14 percent. In this case too, we have decided to waive 12 per cent of the state’s share. As a result, people do not have to pay more than 2 percent tax for the state government.”

It will be applicable for movies in three regional languages — Bengali, Nepali and Santhali.

It is not possible for the single screen cinema theatre owners to continue with their business by paying 28 percent GST.

He said it was he, who was Bengal’s representative in the GST council, who had to fight all alone to bring down the GST on movie tickets. Finally, he had become successful in bringing down the GST on movie tickets to 18 percent for tickets worth less than Rs 100.

Now with the tax slab brought down to 18 percent for tickets, worth less than Rs 100, the cinema theatre owners are in a relief.

In a bid to help them further, the Mamata Banerjee government had decided to waive a major portion of the state’s share in the GST that would get rolled out on July 1 without complete preparation.

The single screen theatre owners have expressed their happiness with the announcement of the state Finance minister.

Mitra further said that it will remain printed on the movie tickets that the state government has waived a major portion of its share of GST on movie tickets.