The GST Council has proposed to raise the peak tax rate to 20%, from the current 14%, in the model goods and services tax Bill to preclude the requirement of approaching Parliament for any change in rates in future.
The change in the peak rate will not alter the 4-slab rate structure of 5, 12, 18 and 28% agreed upon last year, but is only a provision being built into the model law to take care of contingencies in future, two officials in the know told PTI.
The revised draft of model GST law, which was made public in November 2016, provides for a maximum rate of tax under the new regime at 14% (14% central GST and an equal state GST, taking the total to 28%). “There shall be levied a tax called the central/state goods and services tax (CGST/SGST) on all intra-state supplies of goods and/or services… At such rates as may be notified by the central/state government… But not exceeding 14% on the recommendation of the Council and collected in such manner as may be prescribed,” the draft law states.
Officials said this “14%” will now be changed to say the rate will not exceed “20%”. The GST Council, headed by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and comprising representatives of all states, has agreed to keep the upper band of the rate in the law at 20%. “For the moment, we will not tinker with the rate structure of 5, 12, 18 and 28%. The GST Council has decided to keep the upper cap higher at 20% so that in future in case of need to hike tax rate, there is no need to approach Parliament for a nod and the GST Council can raise it,” the officials said.
This means the central GST and state GST can be up to 20% each, leaving the scope for a maximum levy at 40%. “The 4-tier rate structure that has been decided will hold for now. By keeping the upper cap at 20%, we are just keeping an enabling provision which the Council can exercise at a later date after deliberation,” the official added. Mirroring the model GST law, the CGST, SGST and UTGST law will be firmed up by the Centre, states and Union Territories, respectively. The Centre plans to introduce in Parliament the Central GST (CGST) Bill in the forthcoming session beginning March 9. After it is ratified, the states will introduce the State GST (SGST) Bill in their respective legislative Assemblies.
The central and state officials will soon start the exercise to determine which goods and services should fall in which tax bracket and the same will be taken to the Council for approval soon. Together with this, they will also decide the goods and services that would attract a cess on top of the peak rate to create a corpus that can be used for compensating states for any loss of revenue from implementation of GST in the first five years. The government is looking at GST rollout from July 1.
New Delhi, Mar 2 : The Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) today told the Delhi High Court that the UGC notification setting a limit of eight students per professor for M.Phil and PhD courses, was binding on all varsities in the country.
“The said notification is binding and is mandatory in nature and is to be followed by all the Universities (Central, State and Deemed Universities) including JNU,” Justice V Rao was informed.
The court was also told that it was obligatory for JNU to apply the notification.
“It is not the discretion of any university to apply or reject the notification,” Centre’s standing counsel Monika Arora, appearing for JNU, said.
She further said there were over 40 universities and all of them have adopted it.
JNU students have been protesting the UGC notification since February 9 and allegedly blockading the administrative block of the varsity.
Senior advocate Arvind Nigam, appearing for the students, said he did not doubt the validity of the University Grants Commission’s (UGC) notification and was only challenging the procedure of JNU in adopting it.
Taking note of this, the judge said it means the students are not challenging the May 5, 2016 notification of UGC, which allegedly “threatens to put their future in jeopardy as they would not be able to find a supervisor”.
Nigam agreed and said, “I am only questioning procedure of adoption by JNU.”
However, the counsel for UGC raised objection over the maintainability of the petitions.
The petitioners have contended that the notification not only affected the existing students, but would also result in fewer admissions in the current academic session, “thereby violating constitutionally mandated reservation norms”.
JNU, in its affidavit, has stated that the adoption of the notification was in “accordance with the provisions of the JNU Act, Statutes and Policies”.
“Due process has been followed in adoption of the Regulation through its statutory bodies. It is reiterated that New Admission Policy 2016 is in accordance with the reservation policy of the Government of India and therefore any apprehension in this regard are misplaced. Existing JNU students will not be affected by the New Admission policy,” the affidavit stated.
The court fixed the matter for further hearing on March 7.
New Delhi, Mar 2 : The government must declare all computer systems as protected or at least bring them under the purview of ‘protected system’ so as to ensure stringent punishment to hackers, advocate and cyber law expert Pavan Duggal said today.
“On a normal day in India, more than 10,000 cyber attacks take place and most of them go unreported. The protected systems have the immunity of the law that if they are hacked, the punishment is ten-year jail term.
“All the systems must be declared protected,” Duggal said at a seminar on Cyberlaw and Cyber security challenges for companies in the post-demonetisation era.
Protected systems are mentioned in section 70 of the Information Technology Act 2000 under which the government can declare any computer resource which directly or indirectly affects the facility of Critical Information Structure, to be a protected system.
Duggal warned the stakeholders and corporates to be more careful in the post-demonetisation era as India was moving towards a cashless economy.
“After demonetisation, the volume of online transactions has gone up. Companies must comply with Indian legislation, i.e. the IT Act or else they will face trouble,” he added.
“Non-compliance with norms exposes companies to legal issues, both civil and criminal. These unpleasant consequences could be avoided by ensuring compliances with these evolving norms,” Duggal said.
The conference ended with recommendations, including that while cyberlaw as a discipline was integral to today’s corporate operations, stakeholders need to understand the nuances of cyber legal frameworks, the knowledge of which is currently very limited.