Indian opposition to boycott tax launch

NEW DELHI: India’s opposition vowed to boycott the launch of the new national tax, adding to the strain ahead of the country’s biggest ever fiscal reform.

Businesses are bracing for upheaval as India prepares to roll out the long-awaited goods and services tax (GST) with the aim of transforming the nation of 1.2 bil- lion people and its US$2 trillion (RM8.5 trillion) economy into a single market.

The main opposition Congress party dismissed the tax launch event as a “publicity gimmick”.

Other parties said they would join a boycott of a special sitting of the two parliament chambers held by Prime Minister Narendra Modi when the tax took effect at midnight yesterday (local time).

There have only been three previous midnight sittings in India’s history, to mark India’s independence in 1947 and the 25th and 50th anniversaries.

Congress said the nationalist government was “insulting the very memory of India’s freedom struggle and the sacrifices associated with it”.

Rashtriya Janata Dal party spokesman Manoj Kumar Jha said the party would “boycott this mega spectacle of optical illusion.”

The GST is to be rolled out today even as businesses complain they are ill-prepared for the massive changes about to ripple through India’s unwieldy economy.