Last week, the goods and services tax (GST) council, in which the states and the central government participated, announced the GST rate structure. The rates are in four slabs: 5%, 12%, 18% and 28%. The luxury and sin goods, will be taxed above 28% plus additional cess. And essential goods like foodgrains will be in the 0% slab, if we can call it a slab.
This is a major step towards meeting the April 2017 deadline for implementing GST, but by itself this announcement means very little. The GST council will meet a few more times in November, and then more laws will have to be passed in the winter session of Parliament. Post that, state legislatures will have to pass their own laws, and only then will there will be a workable framework for implementing the GST nationwide.
