GST: A Cure For Ills Of Existing Indirect Tax Regime A comprehensive tax structure covering both goods and services viz. Goods and Services Tax (GST) addresses the above-mentioned problems. Simultaneous introduction of GST at both Centre and State levels has integrated taxes on goods and services for the purpose of set-off relief and ensures that both the cascading effects of CENVAT and service tax are removed and a continuous chain of set-off from the original producer’s point/ service provider’s point upto the retailer’s level/ consumer’s level is established In the GST regime, the major indirect taxes have been subsumed in the ambit of GST. The erstwhile concepts of manufacture or sale of goods or rendering of services are no longer applicable since the tax is now levied on “Supply of Goods and/or services”. FRAMEWORK OF GST AS INTRODUCED IN INDIA I. Dual GST: India has adopted a Dual GST model in view of the federal structure of the country. Con
Concept of GST in India Before we proceed with the finer nuances of Indian GST, let us first understand the basic concept of GST. GST is a value added tax levied on manufacture, sale and consumption of goods and services. GST offers comprehensive and continuous chain of tax creditsfrom the producer's point/service provider's point upto the retailer's level/consumer’s level thereby taxing only the value added at each stage of supply chain.The supplier at each stage is permitted to avail credit of GST paid on the purchase of goods and/or services and can set off this credit against the GST payable on the supply of goods and services to be made by him. Thus, only the final consumer bears the GST charged by the last supplier in the supply chain, with set-off benefits at all the previous stages. Since, only the value added at each stage is taxed under GST, there is no tax on tax or cascading of taxes under GST system. GST does not differentiate between goods and services