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By Sheela Mamidenna As the Chairman of the Empowered Group of State Finance Ministers which was instrumental in the formulation of GST Laws in 2009, Dr Asim Kumar Dasgupta can be rightly called as the ‘architect of GST’. A reformer by heart he set out to mastermind the most ambitious tax reform in Indian history by introducing the Value Added Tax (VAT). He was the man who was instrumental in doing away with many draconian tax levies such as octroi and highway toll in West Bengal and was fondly referred to as ‘my US-trained finance minister’ by the then Chief Minister of West Bengal, Jyoti Basu.  Dr Dasgupta, an MIT graduate continues to inspire the new generation as he lectures at various ...

The Dollar Business Bureau Terming the rollout of GST as an important achievement, Asian Development Bank President, Takehiko Nakao, who was on a 3-day visit to India termed the roll-out of the GST as an important achievement for this government. But added that this achievement is not without its flaws. He was appreciative of the government’s determination to push forward with reforms, but wanted the government to put more energy into ‘labour’, ‘land acquisition laws’ and FDI so that Indian economy can grow faster than that of China’s.  Speaking to the media about his views on the rollout of the GST he said, ‘it is difficult to gauge the impact of GST on the economy until it is implemented but the best thing ...

The Dollar Business Bureau  Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, met and interacted with sixteen Governors of various provinces of Russia on May 2 and reiterated  his vision that relationships between regions and provinces of two countries are a vital part of nurturing the bilateral relationship. He recalled warmly his visit to Astrakhan province of Russia in 2001, as Chief Minister of Gujarat.  The Governors explained opportunities for increasing interaction, people to people, and business links between their provinces, and India.  Several matters and issues common to India and the Russian states were discussed at the meeting. The Governors who attended the interaction included Governors of Arkhangelsk Oblast, Astrakhan Oblast, Irkutsk region, Moscow region, Primorye Territory, Republic of Kalmykia, Tatarstan, St. Petersburg, Sakhalin Oblast, Sverdlovsk ...

Ranjeet Mahtani & Stella Joseph  This week saw the GST Council make great strides in gathering consensus on unresolved issues. Three key decisions emerging from the meeting held on January 16, 2017 were as under: Consensus was achieved on the aspect of dual control between the Centre and the States. It was also agreed that States would have the power to tax activities carried out within 12 nautical miles. It was felt by the GST Council that July 1, 2017 seems to be the likely date when GST will be implemented in the country. As regards the aspect of dual control, it was decided that for assessees with an annual threshold of Rs. 1.5 crores or less, the States would have power to administer i.e. power ...

PTI Moving towards rolling out GST from April 1, Centre and states today agreed on a timetable for deciding on the tax rate and completion of legislative work but differences remained on the turnover limit for exemption from the new tax. The first meeting of the newly constituted GST Council saw states like Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh demanding a larger say than one-state-one-vote principle that puts a smaller state on equal footing with a large manufacturing one. While their demand was overruled, consensus also eluded first day of the meeting over the issue of exemption to dealers from the Goods and Services Tax (GST). While some states demanded traders with turnover of Rs 10 lakh or less be exempted, a ...

The Dollar Business Bureau Tough regulatory measures make India a difficult place to do business and the country needs concerted action on several fronts to improve business environment, said Onno Ruhl, Country Director, World Bank. “A disproportionately high regulatory burden is borne by businesses in India today. This difficult regulatory burden is exemplified by India’s current rank of 142 among 189 nations in the World Bank’s Doing Business 2015 study. “The stark reality is that India remains a difficult place to do business,” said the World Bank Director in his foreward to a study titled ‘Assessment of State Implementation of Business Reforms’. According to the study released on Monday, India does not feature among the top 100 countries on 8 of ...

The Dollar Business Bureau   Ahead of The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy’s Global Investors Meet & Expo (RE-Invest) from February 15-17, 2015 in New Delhi, with a theme to attract large scale investments for the renewable energy sector in India, the government is contemplating making the land owners as stakeholders in the Renewable Energy projects so that they get annual or monthly rent. The new move is to generate 1,00,000 MW of installed solar power capacity by 2022 from the present capacity of 3,000 MW. Piyush Goyal, Power, Coal and Renewable Energy Minister said that the government is also looking at rooftop solar model. He said, “We are not only looking at large plants like 40,000 MW ...