FTCCI organized a Seminar on the 50th GST Council Recommendations

Hyderabad, August 01: GST Tribunal will be a reality by the end of this year said Mr Sandeep Praksh, Chief Commissioner of Customs and Central Tax, Hyderabad Zone while addressing a group of GST Consultants and Corporates at a Seminar FTCCI organised on the 50th GST Council Recommendations.  I am confident that by the end of this year, GST Tribunal will be functional, at least some benches will start functioning, he said.

The Commissioner recalled his long association with the city.  I came to this city in 1991 about 32 years back as a trainee officer.  Now I am a Chief Commissioner.  The city changed a lot since then.  I cherish my association with the city he said.

We used to have so many taxes and so much confusion prevailed.  All that situation is now a thing of the past. GST is a big boost to cooperative federalism. GST is a comprehensive indirect tax that was designed to bring indirect taxation under one umbrella. GST as our Prime Minister Modi says, is a good and simple tax regime., the Chief Commissioner added

The GST when it was introduced in the year 2017 and 2018, the collection was 7.18 lakh crore for the 9th month period.   The same in 2022 and 2023 was 18.10 lakh crore.  It was 22% more than the collection in the year 2021-2022.  Initially, it was the target for everyone working in the GST to ensure one lakh core was collected.  But for the past 15 to 16 months, the monthly average collection was a little over INR 1.50 lakh core.  The latest figures for the month of July which is just out is 1.65 lakh crore, which is 11% more than the previous month. 

It is for the fifth time the monthly collections surpassed INR 1.65 lakh crore, shared the Chief Commissioner.  Even the Number of Registered Tax assesses have swelled to 1.4cror, he shared. 

Earlier we used to have one budget in a year and where we used to discuss tax-related matters after the budget was presented. Now GST Council meets regularly to clarify the many matters that concern all of us.

The 50th GST Council meeting covered three important matters under the GST law. There were rate decisions taken on goods and services, as well as clarifications issued and rate regularisations undertaken. Secondly, the recommendations of various GoMs were discussed. The third matter involved clarifying that the compensation cess dues

It was further decided to regularise issues relating to past periods on an “as is basis” with regard to Raw cotton which is an issue pertaining to the state of Telangana. 

Speaking further Mr. Sandeep Prakash added that there was no limit for simplification. It is a continuation process. Nothing is perfect, he added 

The job of the tax collector is to take feedback and escalate it to the council.  The good thing is GST Council listens to your feedback. Chief Commissioner also took questions from the audience and answered them. 

Earlier Mankoskar Surendrakumar Chandrakant Rao, Commissioner-Central Tax, Medchal Commissionerate gave an overview of the technical matters of the 50th GST Council Recommendations. 

People said Roti, Kapda, and Makan cannot have the same GST.  But see today all of them have the same GST of 5%.  Sooth sayers said Invoice Matching is not possible in GST. But it proved it other way.  Invoice matching is a mechanism under which all the taxable supplies made under GST will be matched against all the taxable supplies received by the buyer. Everybody said Auto populated is not possible in India, but again this proved them wrong.  Now people ask for an automatic refund, which I am sure will be possible soon.

Welcoming the gathering Meela Jayadev, President of FTCCI said GST is marching towards ease of compliance. As these changes are a continuation process, we at FTCCI organise seminars like this at regular intervals as it will enrich the knowledge of the consultants and several other GST-practising professionals. 

Mr Sudhir VS, Chair of GST and Customs Committee of FTCCI giving his opening remarks said the budget review was once a year affair.  But that is not the case with GST.  GST Council Meeting is a mini-budget itself that happens frequently. The 50th Council Meeting has paved the way towards resting disputes.   Now GST compliance is made effortless and smooth.  Several simplification processes help businesses comply with Goods and Services Tax (GST) regulations. The tool automates filing tax, invoice management and other compliance-related tasks, which helps reduce errors, improve efficiency and ensure adherence to the law. In fact, it is so simplified that consultants’ intervention is minimised.  And it is good for trade, he said. 

Mohd. Irshad Ahmed gave a detailed presentation and clarified a number of doubts

S. Mallikarjun Gupta, and Harshit Jain, the Co-Chairs of the GST & Customs Committee; Suresh Kumar Singhal, Senior Vice President of FTCCI, S. Thirumalai, Advocate and Past President of FTCCI, Harshit Jain participated in the seminar along with 150 other professionals.

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