Goods and Services Tax (GST) in India

GST is an indirect tax which has replaced many extant indirect taxes in India. The Goods and Service Tax Act was passed in the Parliament on 29th March, 2017. The Act came into effect on 1st July, 2017; Goods & Services Tax Law in India is a comprehensive, multistage, destination-based tax that is levied on every value addition. 

Under the GST regime, the tax is levied at every point of sale. In the case of intrastate sales, Central GST and State GST are charged. Inter-state sales are chargeable to Integrated GST. In the earlier indirect tax regime, there were many indirect taxes levied by both state and centre. States mainly collected taxes in the form of Value Added Tax (VAT). Every state had a different set of rules and regulations. Inter-state sale of goods was taxed by the Centre. CST (Central State Tax) was applicable in case of inter-state sale of goods. Other than above, there were many indirect taxes like entertainment tax, octroi and local tax that was levied by state and centre. 

The following is the list of indirect taxes in the pre-GST regime. CGST, SGST, and IGST has replaced all of these: Central Excise Duty, Duties of Excise, Additional Duties of Excise, Cess, State VAT, Central Sales Tax, Purchase Tax, Luxury Tax, Entertainment Tax, Entry Tax, Taxes on advertisements, Taxes on lotteries, betting, and gambling. 

Conclusion: Revenue implication of GST. Nearly two years have passed since, and there’s a widespread perception that GST revenue growth has not lived upto expectations. Post implementation of GST, the Centre’s revenue from goods and services (excluding Central excise on petroleum and tobacco) registered a decline of 10 per cent in 2017/18, compared to the revenue from the subsumed taxes in 2016/17. In 2018/ 19, the Union government had to revise its GST collection target by Rs. 1 lakh crore - from Rs. 7.43 lakh crore to Rs. 6.43 lakh crore. The target for 2019/20 is Rs. 6.63 lakh crore, just Rs. 20,000 crore more than the last year’s revised target