TAIT conducts Workshop on GST

Trade Association of Information Technology (TAIT) has recently conducted a workshop discussing in detail with Shailesh P. Sethi, Advocate & Founder, SPS Legal, in the area of Indirect Tax Laws. 

Shailesh P. Sethi, Advocate & Founder, SPS Legal, said, "GST is not merely a tax reform, it is a fundamental business reform which will change the way business activities are conducted in the country by anyone. The dual structure of GST is the compulsion of federal character of our country and therefore a unified GST across the country is not possible. It will also be applied on bundled services. For instance, if one books a Shatabdi train ticket which includes meal, it is a bundle of supplies. It is a composite supply where the products cannot be sold separately. The one purchasing will not buy just the train meal and not the train ticket. The transportation of passenger is, therefore, the principal supply. Other examples will be dry fruit box, lodging services which come with food and stay package, etc."

Further elaborating on the GST tax regime, he explained that the existing origin based consumption tax such as Central Sales Tax (CST), service tax bill will be a thing of the past with the introduction of GST. Under GST, all transactions involving the inter-state supply of goods and services will be subjected to IGST but with the credit available to the recipient in another state. Presently, CST is not refundable. With a much wider availability of credit or input tax credit, GST is expected to mitigate the cascading effect of tax-on-tax to a large extent. It will help in creating a borderless common national market for goods and services and ensure a smooth movement of goods and services across the country.