By Manjiri Joshi,News18

Copyright news18

Union Home Minister Amit Shah, in an exclusive chat with Network18 Group Editor-in-Chief Rahul Joshi, said the GST 2.0 reforms will be remembered as one of the greatest in the history of the country.
“With GST, 16 different types of taxes — octroi, excise, sales, entertainment tax, and many others — were merged into one nationwide electronic sales tax system. E-way bills were introduced. Over the years, more than 200 small changes were made to smoothen the system and resolve teething problems. As this continued, the nation’s income grew, going from Rs 80,000 crore to Rs 2 lakh crore,” said Shah.
Shah said the move has increased “the trust of the states, people and traders in the government”. “With higher income, the government was able to reduce taxes further on more than 395 items. Many daily-use items were placed in the 0% or 5% tax bracket. Essential sectors such as exports were given scientific GST. Sectors such as health, agriculture, and employment were given tax relief. Such a major tax relief was never seen before. This has benefited farm-related items, women, people’s health expenditures, insurance has become more affordable, and even two-wheelers and four-wheelers saw tax cuts. All this came through GST reforms,” said the Home Minister.

“People see that if they pay the tax and increase the government’s revenue, the government will pass on the benefits through tax cuts, which in turn strengthens faith in governance. It was invisible since independence, but is now visible for the first time. When any government says that if you pay taxes, we will reduce them, it will boost investment. With increased trust, the market will grow, production activity will increase, exports and income will rise. It is a multi-dimensional reform, benefiting multiple sectors. I believe this will be remembered as one of the biggest reforms to date,” he said.
Commenting on the earlier governments, Shah said, “The discussion around GST has been happening since the time of the Congress government, even when Shri Chidambaram was the Finance Minister, and when Shri Pranab Mukherjee was the Finance Minister. The Congress is trying to mislead by saying it was their idea. Fine, if it was your idea, why was it never implemented? Every time, they would say the states objected. What were the states objecting to? The citizens of this country need to know what it was.”

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Shah said that everyone knew that with GST, states’ resources would face a shortfall, so states were then demanding guarantees from the Centre. “The Congress never gave those guarantees and never created a consensus, which is why GST was never implemented,” he said.
Highlighting how PM Narendra Modi managed to get the states on board, Shah said, “When Narendra Modi ji became the Prime Minister, he gave a Constitutional guarantee that states’ revenue growth rate would be nearly double with tax collections. He made a Constitutional promise and fulfilled it. Almost all states will get the payment by November. States came on board because the Centre gave a guarantee and fulfilled it.”