GST: Traders to face challenges

New Delhi, June 4: With the Goods and Services Tax (GST) headed for a July 1 roll-out, industry leaders on Saturday said that the traders needed to gear up for the transition as it was unlikely that the new indirect tax regime would be postponed further.

"With assurance from state Finance Ministers and the Goods and Services Tax Network (GSTN) on the readiness of implementing GST ready from July 1, the onus now lies on the industry to prepare. Adequate information is now available in the public domain vis-a-vis return formats and rules, thus it is critical for the industry to gear up their IT systems for meeting reporting requirements for filing returns on the GSTN portal," said Rajeev Dimri, Leader, Indirect Tax, BMR and Associates LLP.

Welcoming the agreement of states to roll-out GST from July 1, the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) said: "Now India is moving towards adoption of its largest indirect tax reform and to ensure its seamless implementation, we call upon the government to declare first nine months of GST implementation as trial period since still large number of traders and small businesses have yet to adopt computerisation."

"Much preparedness is required at the level of traders. A large number of traders are even unaware how technology will operate in business under GST regime. Obviously many challenges will occur which needs to be sorted out and as such trial period is required," said the confederation's Secretary General Praveen Khandelwal.

Allowing input credit on excise paid stock is a welcome step as it will restrict any likely inflation of prices, he said.

Pratik Jain, Partner and Leader Indirect Tax, PwC, said: "Stage now seems set for July 1 rollout as the government doesn't seem to be blinking amidst demand of deferment by a couple of months."