Mobile Phone Sales to Be Hit, Say Industry Experts, as GST Hike Makes Them More Costly

With the GST Council, headed by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, increasing the GST on mobile phones from 12 percent to 18 percent on Saturday, industry experts feel it would hit the industry and the consumers hard.

The GST Council on Saturday decided to increase GST rates on mobile phones to 18 percent from 12 percent with effect from April 1, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said

The Central Bureau of Investigation has registered a case against Deepak Pandit, an Assistant Commissioner of Goods and Service Tax and Central Excise, on corruption charges for amassing assets worth over Rs 3.96 crore which are 376 per cent above his known sources of income, officials said on Friday.

An employee of the GST Bhavan showed immense courage and patriotism when he climbed nine floors of the fire-hit building on Monday to save the national tricolour from being burnt.

A fire broke out on the eighth floor of a government building in Mumbai's Mazgaon today. In visuals, black smoke is seen billowing out from the windows of the GST Bhavan. Firefighters said no one was injured or trapped.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday said the Central government is plugging the loopholes in the Good and Services Tax (GST) with the use of technology and is working towards eight per cent growth rate.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday attacked the Congress for the delay in implementation of the Goods and Services Tax or GST, saying that it was only after he took office that the outstanding issues were resolved, paving the way for the rollout of the unified tax regime.

The monumental blunder of demonetisation, a flawed GST and putting the squeeze on banks were the three major errors committed by the government that sent the economy into a tailspin, senior Congress leader P Chidambaram said today.

GST reduction and incentive based scrappage policy are the need of the hour, but all indirect benefits should curb liquidity crisis and uplift general customers' sentiment.

In the 2020 Budget session Government has announced handholding support to the auto component industry for technological upgradation, R&D support and strategy planning.

Early in her presentation of the country's budget, finance minister Nirmala Sithraman referred to her predecessor, Arun Jaitley, and said his work on introducing the Goods and Services Tax was a huge contribution. Mr Jaitley died in August 25, 2019.

The Union Budget 2020-21 comes at a time when the economy is staring at a more than 11-year low annual expansion rate and thousands of job cuts amid weakness across sectors.

The Indian economy experienced some abrupt slowdown in 2019 due to turbulence in non-banking financial institutions and major reform measures such as GST and demonetisation, but it is not in a recession, IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva has said.

Goods and Services Tax (GST) collections have crossed the Rs 1 lakh crore mark for the third month in a row in January with improved compliance and plugging of evasion, sources said on Friday.