Interest On GST Dues To Be Waived: FM | NDTV Profit
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00:00Abhishek Jain, Partner and National Head of Indirect Tax at KPMG India with us this morning.
00:04Abhishek, very good morning to you. Great to have you on. We were keen to get a sense of the GST
00:12meat outcomes and the implications in your view that you see. Let me start with one key decision
00:21which has impacted markets at least through the last week, which is fertilizers. And we saw
00:26fertilizer stocks run up etc. Now this has been referred to the group of ministers. What does
00:32this mean? Can we assume this means that essentially at least the GST council seems
00:37to be pretty positive on some kind of rate rationalization as far as fertilizers are concerned?
00:44So rate rationalization, as the Honorable Finance Minister said, they have not taken many bold
00:50decisions on rate rationalization. And they said that they will wait for the
00:55recommendations of the GOM and they will take it up in the next meeting. So it's too early to say
01:01in which direction the rate rationalization would go overall and also specifically for the
01:06fertilizer industry. So we'll still have to wait for the recommendations of the GOM and then let's
01:11see what the GST council does. Yes, but having said that, they are open to look at the rate
01:17rationalization, but we'll still have to wait for what the GOM says. Abhishek, to your mind,
01:25what was the biggest takeaway? Because there was some move on, you know, allied train services,
01:31some relief for hostel students, etc. What do you think was the big takeaway from the GST council
01:37meet? Or did it seem like, you know, the key decisions were left for after the budget?
01:43No, I think several plethora of favorable decisions were taken, all benefiting the industry.
01:50The big one is the amnesty scheme for periods, financial year 17, 18 to 19 to 20,
01:58where for matters where fraud, suppression and all is not involved, if the taxpayers deposit
02:05the tax by March 2025, then the interest and penalty would be waived. I think this is a huge
02:11sort of relief and the government realizes that the initial period of GST, there could be many
02:16areas where the law was not clear or people did not have clarity and hence there could be
02:22non-payment of GST. But with interest and penalty, normally that is applicable. People are reluctant
02:29to sort of close these matters, but this is a good window for all the taxpayers to relook at
02:35all these matters and wherever they feel that yes, the tax is payable, they can just pay the tax
02:40without any interest and penalty. Having said that, I mean, antiprofiting provisions, they've
02:45announced a sunset period after March 2025, which again, I think industry has been asking for a long
02:52time because in the initial years of GST when it was introduced, yes, the antiprofiting provisions
02:59made sense because the benefit of GST needed to be passed on to the consumers. But after six,
03:06seven years, I don't think that's really needed. So, that's again a big benefit for the industry.
03:11Again, several industries like banks, insurance, corporate guarantees, valuation of import of
03:17services, reduction in the amount of pre-deposit for filing of appeals. So, I think they've come
03:24out with several, several notifications and circulars, which I think would really help. I
03:29think the most important thing is that the government looks at the GST Council, looks very,
03:34very open, listening to ideas. The industry had filed these representations over a long period of
03:40time, but the government has considered most of them and come out with favorable outcomes in terms
03:46of clarifications or amendments in law. I think that's very, very encouraging. I mean, that also
03:51dictates how the government would go forward, have a view on these things. Of course, the good
03:58collections in GST have really helped and the government has that elbow room. But I think I was
04:03really, really encouraged to see so many positive outcomes for the industry. Okay. So, positive
04:08outcomes for the industry, especially in terms of easing the litigation process, I would say,
04:14that would be the big takeaway more than anything else. Abhishek, thank you so much for joining us
04:19and, you know, giving us an overview on why the GST Council meet was positive in the terms of
04:24the direction the Council is actually taking. For the markets, I don't think too much at all,
04:30and the run-up was irrational in the first place to expect that everything from online gaming to
04:34fertilizers will be addressed in the GST meet. That might be some time away.