The GST council has decided to waive off late fees for all taxpayers who have filed GSTR 1, if all refunds are filed by 10 January 2020. In its 38th meeting held today, the council has also extended the deadline for filing GSTR 9 for FY18 to 31 January 2020.

In another major announcement, the council has agreed to levy single rate of 28 per cent Goods and Services Tax (GST) on both state run and state authorised lottery. The new rate shall be effective from 1st March 2020. Revenue Secretary Ajay Bhushan Pandey also announced the exemption of  long term lease on industrial plots to facilitate setting up of industrial parks.

Amid concerns of a revenue shortfall, the centre has set a target of Rs 1.1 lakh crore monthly GST collection between December 2019 and March 2020. Of these four months, Rs 1.25 lakh collections have to be achieved in at least one month. Gross GST collections crossed the Rs 1.1 lakh crore mark only once in FY20 till now. At the current trend, the GST tax collection target is likely to be missed by at least Rs 1 lakh crore. For FY20, the government is targeting Rs 6.63 lakh crore from its share of GST revenues.

Also Read: How new GST return filing system may make life easier for taxpayers

Revenue secretary Ajay Bhushan Pandey held a video conference meeting with top tax officials of departments looking after both income tax and indirect taxes such as GST and asked them to step up efforts to achieve tax targets, reported by PTI.

Meanwhile, the ‘e-invoicing’ system is set to roll-out from 1 January 2020 in a phased manner for generating business-to-business invoices on a voluntary basis. This will be made mandatory from 1 April 2020. However, even from April, it will remain voluntary for businesses having a turnover of less than Rs 100 crore. E-invoicing is aimed at eliminating the need for manual data entry and allowing interoperability, reducing data entry errors. It will also help in availing input tax credit in a faster way.

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Published On : 18-12-2019

Source : Financial Express