E-way bill for interstate goods from April

NEW DELHI: The e-way bill, to be generated under the GST for all inter-state movement of goods valued at over Rs 50,000, may become mandatory from April 1, two months after it was originally planned.

The recommendation of the Group of Ministers on Information Technology would be considered by the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council during its March 10 meeting, the group convener and Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Modi told reporters on Saturday.

However, the implementation date for intra-state movement of goods is not yet decided and it would be implemented in a phase-wise manner with four-five states being allowed to come on board based on response to the inter-state movement, he said.

The requirement of generating and carrying e-way bill was to become mandatory from February 1 but it was indefinitely postponed due to technological glitches.

Modi, who is the state Finance Minister, said the infrastructure has been substantially upgraded for smooth implementation this time with two phases of load testing complete and the third phase to be completed in the next few days.

“We are expecting 26 lakh to 50 lakh returns to be filed per day which we expect to go up to 75 lakh in future. So we are preparing for that,” he said.

The implementation of this electronic documentation system, to track the movement of goods and designed to prevent tax evasion, was put on hold until after the GST stabilised following the rollout of the new indirect tax regime from July 1 last year.