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States will be holding a meeting with Union Finance Minister, Pranab Mukherjee, next month for preparing the final draft of the items, which need to be a part of the proposed Goods and Services Tax
“We will meet the finance minister on October 8 and then finalise the list,” chairman of Empowered group of State finance ministers Asim Dasgupta said. He mentioned that states have decided on two rates in GST structure – the standard one and a lower one, which is meant for the essential goods.
Along with the precious items will have a special rate, which will be effective with the implementation of the new tax system, which is slated to be introduced with effect from April 1, 2010.
“The list of goods and services to be included in the list has not been finalised yet. There would be a dual structure of GST, one at the centre and the other at the states level.
While there will be two basic rates in the states, the centre is yet to take a call on the number of rates.
Since fiscal stimulus is mainly given by cutting excise duty by 6% and service tax by 2%, the rate would also decide whether stimulus would continue or rolled back or diluted”, says reports.
He also mentioned that the central and state structure will go in with each other, but the centre may opt for a single rate. The exact rates will be finalised after the decision on the items to be included in GST is taken into consideration. When the list of items in GST is finalised, exempted goods category would also be known.
The items which may be excluded from GST list can be essential goods like food grains. But he added that the decision regarding food grains is not yet reached.
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