PIONEEREDGE NEWS SERVICE | Dehradun
Uttarakhand is likely to suffer a revenue loss of Rs 1,500-3,000 crore per year after introduction of the two-tier Goods and Services Tax (GST) by the Union government claimed All India Congress Committee (AICC) secretary and Manglaur MLA Qazi Nizamuddin on Saturday.
Interacting with the media-persons at the headquarters of the State Congress, Nizamuddin said that India has a system of cooperative federalism in which the State had an autonomy to decide taxes but the introduction of the GST gave a serious blow to cooperative federalism and the interests of the States. He said that the union government has conceded that the GST II regime will result in an annual loss of about Rs 48,000 crore which means that the share of the State in the GST will also reduce.
He said that for a State like Uttarakhand with poor financial conditions it will be very difficult to compensate for the losses due to the GST rate cut. The Congress MLA said that 57 per cent of the State budget is spent on committed expenses. He demanded that the centre should announce a relief package for the states so that they are compensated for the losses under the GST-II regime.
He claimed that the government was forced to cut GST rates under pressure from the Congress party and the reduction has proved the Congress leader Rahul Gandhi correct who had termed GST as the ‘Gabbar Singh Tax’. Nizamuddin said that the GST I was introduced without any preparation which proved detrimental for small businesses in the country.
The Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) president Karan Mahara said that the government should set up a mechanism to ensure that the benefit of the GST reduction reaches the general public. Questioning the silence of chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami in the meeting of the GST council, Mahara said that the CM should have raised the concerns of the State and the loss in its revenue due to GST reduction.
