By Aditya Raj Das
NEW DELHI: The All India Tax Advocates Form (AITAF) has urged the Finance Minister Arun Jaitley to delay the implementation of the Goods and Service Tax (GST) as the industry especially small time businessmen will need time to equip thesemselves with the necessary infrastructure to migrate to the new tax regime.
“Even as the GST is scheduled to be imlementated with effect from July One, the new tax rollout sould be delayed by at least a quarter as industry especially small time assesees would require time to prepare itself,” the AITAF President M K Gandhi said in a statement issued here.
Even after all the four GST related Bills are approved by Parliament, industry would need at least 3-4 months time to be GST ready, especially on the IT infrastructure front, Gandhi a noted tax consultant said.
“Most IT companies would come out with their patches and updates after the final law is crystallised. This exercise will take some time. Small business establishments will take time to prepare themselves to migrate to the new tax regime,” he said.
As of today, services sector has some confusion over interpretation of the law and is awaiting clarity from government, Gandhi said.
Quoting Finance Minister, Gandhi said “GST is a transactional tax and not an income tax. Transactional tax can start in any part of the financial year and therefore, the range of timing when it has to come into force because of constitutional necessity is April 1, 2017 to September 16, 2017.”
“The proposed July One implementation date for the GST looks unachievable because of the short window of time that will be available to the industry after the GST related legislations are passed,” he said. E