Government celebrates 1st GST Day; Finance Minister and Industry Stalwarts commemorate the first year of the unprecedented reform of Indian taxation

• India was one of the most complicated tax systems in the world. Multiple taxes, multiple returns to be filed by assessees, interface with multiple tax authorities, cascading effect of taxes, rising inflation, no free flow of goods across the country, fragmented markets across the country, inter alia, were some of the tenuous issues plaguing the indirect taxation system in India. GST has persuaded people to do businesses in a transparent manner without evading taxes
• GST had an unequivocal support of the Prime Minister of India, hence the Union Government could work closely with the States in a coordinated and collaborative fashion to make GST a success. “We analysed reasons why past Governments could not implement the GST. We resolved all issues raised by the States and assured them the immunity from fall in their revenue collection. The GST Council is India's first consensus-based federal decision-making body”.
• This reform has created a unified market, the cascading of taxes has been eliminated, the weighted average of total taxation basket has come down, the GST Council is working upon continuous rationalisation of tax slabs, advance direct tax payments increased as result of successful implementation of GST, among others. The Minister informed that the total indirect tax collection for 9 month period in the previous financial year post implementation of GST is about Rs. 8.2 lakh crores, which if extrapolated for the whole year comes to about Rs. 11 lakh crores, an 11.9% increase in indirect tax collections. 
• GST Council is constantly working in that direction and the desired rationalisation will come with the setting in of the stability of GST system, increasing tax collections through curbing tax evasion and increasing the tax net. an increase of 1.5% in indirect tax collections is expected in the Non-oil category, which will facilitate the automatic rationalisation of tax slabs in near future.
• Dr. Ambedkar stitched the Nation through one Constitution, Sardar Patel bonded the fragmented Nation geographically, now GST is a landmark reform that has transformed the Nation into an economic union with the motto ‘ONE NATION, ONE TAX, ONE MARKET’. No other Nation in the world, so huge, with so many regional socio-economic and political interests has been able to implement such a tax reform ever in history.
• This reform has put an end to the illegal activities like tax evasion by simplifying the tax administration and bringing a transformation in the culture of trade and industry in the country towards faithful payment of indirect taxes. The youth of India has embraced the reform with open hands. This tax reform is dedicated to the young generation of India who wants to conduct their businesses in a legal and transparent fashion.
• Terming GST as a Game changer for small businesses, enterprises having a turnover of Rs. 20 lakhs are exempted from GST and those with a turnover up to Rs. 1 crore have to pay 1% tax. In the coming monsoon session, the Government is proposing to bring an amendment to extend this limit to businesses with Rs. 1.5 crores turnover