Presenting the 2017 budget, finance minister Arun Jaitley on Wednesday left the excise and service tax largely unchanged, keeping hopes alive for the roll out of the ambitious goods and services tax (GST) regime in July. “Implementation of GST is likely to bring more taxes both to central and state governments because of widening of tax net. I have preferred not to make many changes in current regime of excise and service tax because the same are to be replaced by GST soon,” Jaitley said. “A lot of work is left, I have already written to the union finance minister pointing out 13 things that need to be done. India’s biggest tax reform, the GST, which aims to replace myriad local levies with a single tax, has missed several deadlines both during the UPA and the NDA rule.

Source: Hindustan Times February 01, 2017 12:11 UTC