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FM Jaitley said it would be mandatory for manufacturers to pass on benefits to consumers The much-awaited mechanism for anti-profiteering will be decided upon by the GST Council on  Saturday, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley told the Lok Sabha on Tuesday. He also expressed the hope  that other sectors would follow suit of the auto sector to cut prices due to the effective lower  rates under the goods and services tax (GST). Referring to concerns raised by members with regard to impact of GST on prices, Jaitley said it  would be mandatory for manufacturers to pass on the benefits of reduction in taxes to consumers. He hoped that the decision of price cut by automobile sector on account of benefit of input tax  credit would be followed by others manufacturers. "What if input tax benefit is not transferred to consumers?...we are meeting a few days from  now...In a short while, we are going to finalise the entire mechanism as far as anti-profiteering  is concerned. "Al

After demonetisation, which almost brought house sales to a halt, real estate developers are  grappling with the Real Estate Regulation and Development Act (Rera) and the goods and services  tax (GST). “Real estate has gone through many down cycles since 1991. But I have never seen three  tsunamis together,” said Niranjan Hiranandani, managing director of the Hiranandani group, one of  the country’s oldest and largest property developers. “This is the worst time in the careers of many developers. If you have rental income, you can  stay. Otherwise, it will be very difficult,” added Vijay Wadhwa, chairman of the Wadhwa group, a  Mumbai-based developer. “The law is very strict and developers cannot be lackadaisical in their  dealings anymore,” said Wadhwa. Life for developers, which are often criticised for opaque practices, has turned topsy turvy  after Rera came into force from May 1. Most developers in Maharashtra are focusing on completing  projects or registering them with t

   The government has collected over Rs 1.80 lakh crore in direct tax till July 15 in the current  fiscal, an increase of 21.4 pre cent year-on-year, "belying" fears of slowdown in economic  activities.  "The current growth rate is higher than the target rate of 15.32 required to achieve the Budget  Estimate," Minister of State for Finance Santosh Kumar Gangwar said in a written reply in the  Rajya Sabha.  The government aims to collect Rs 9.8 lakh crore through direct taxes in 2017-18.  The minister further said the current growth rate in direct tax collections is "quite healthy,  belying any apprehension of reduction" in the level of economic or commercial activities.  He said the government has taken several initiatives to boost economic activity in the country  and several measures were announced in the Budget 2017-18.  Replying to another question, Gangwar said the number of cyber crimes pertaining to credit card,  ATM, debit card and in

Companies tweak strategies as every product sold needs to have notional value in new tax regime There's no such thing as free pizza -or `free' anything -under GST, it would appear. That staple of promotional schemes among consumerfacing packaged products and  foods services companies -buy one get one free -is being axed by many of them a month after the goods and services tax was rolled out. The move is necessitated by the GST fine print, according to which compa nies will have to pay additional tax on anything they give away as `free' to consumers and  stand to lose input cre dit when they classify a product sale as `free'. That's forcing companies to look for other ways to win over customers. “We are doing away with  buy-oneget-one-free offers and are switching to upfront discounting,“ said Mayank Shah, marketing head at biscuit maker Parle Products. “This is causing disruption but it's what is required under the goods and services tax.“ In a slowi

Total customs revenues rise to Rs 26,500 cr as rollout of the new tax regime completes a month The collection of Integrated Goods and Services Tax from imports crossed Rs 20,000 crore in July — the first month of the roll out of the new indirect tax regime,  pointing towards a major jump in revenues. Total customs revenues in July 2017 stood at Rs 26,500 crore as against Rs 16,625 crore collected in July 2016. Collections have been quite robust,” a government official said. However, the official said IGST collections have also received a boost from the fact that there is a component of state GST as well in the tax. Besides, the government has done away with a number of countervailing duty (CVD) exemptions and not extended them under the GST regime that were available in the  previous tax  regime, such as that on some electronic products. The rise in customs revenues on imports should take care of any decline in GST collections because of any production-related disruption

The income tax (IT) department on Monday extended the deadline for e filing of returns by five days, till August 5, after complaints were received that assessees were  not able to submit returns. The department had earlier ruled out extending the deadline for filing returns. The department also eased the timeframe for linking permanent account number (PAN) with Aadhaar by August 30. Assessees can for now simply quote their Aadhaar number  or enrolment ID. “In view of the difficulties faced by taxpayers, date for efiling of income tax returns for FY 2016-17 has been extended to August 5, 2017,” the  department tweeted. Last minute inundation and heavy traffic on the website of the efiling portal led to the extension. Assessees, particularly those with some discrepancies in their name or year of birth, or any other data on their Aadhaar and PAN cards, were not able to submit  returns. Besides, it was reported the site was down forawhile. “Some people for whom PAN and Aadhaa

The Goods and Services Tax Council is likely to consider lowering of tax rates for job works for  making garments to 5 per cent from 18 per cent,a source in the finance ministry has said. The  panel, headed by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and comprising representatives of all the 29  states, is likely to consider removing anomaly in taxation in cases where the intermediate goods  are taxed at the highest bracket than the tax on final output, the source said. The Business Standard, New Delhi, 01st August 2017