October 06, 2017: Government has announced major relief in GST for exporters and small and medium enterprises. The composition threshold limit under GST has been enhanced from 75 lak rupees to one crore.
Briefing reporters after a marathon 8-hour long GST Council meeting, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said that under composite scheme, traders will pay one percent, manufacturers two percent and restaurants five percent. GST tax payers upto 1.5 crore rupees turnover can now file their return on quarterly basis, in place of monthly basis.
Exporters will start getting refunds of their input credit for the month of July from 10th of October, and for August from 18th of this month. This is an interim arrangement which will be operated by Central and State Government officials. Exporters will have e-wallet from 1st April, 2018 for getting their refunds.
Mr. Jaitley said, the Council discussed e-way bill. He said, Karnataka is already having good experience with it and after first of January it will go to other states. He said, items including Khakhra, plain chapati, food packets used in ICDS scheme and unbranded Namkeen will now be taxed at 5 percent instead of 18 percent.
GST rate on unbranded medicines have also been reduced to 12 percent to 5 percent. Tax on parts of diesel engine has been reduced from 28 to 18 percent.
To contain the cost of irrigation schemes involving high amount of labour, GST rate has been brought down to 5 percent.
The Finance Minister announced that a concept paper on GST rate fitment has been approved by GST council. He said, the council has formed a Group of state finance ministers to look into different issues. (AIR News)
