The GST Council on Friday decided to set up a seven-member Group of Ministers (GoM) to look into Kerala’s demand for imposing an additional cess over GST to meet the financial requirements in case of a natural calamity.
Apart from senior union ministers, the committee would comprise members from the North Eastern, hill and coastal states which are most vulnerable to natural calamities, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley told reporters here after the council meeting.
He said the GoM would evaluate all possibilities and present its recommendations in the next few weeks after which another meeting of the GST Council will be called.
Jaitley said it was important to have a mature view on the issue instead of acting in haste as this would set a precedent for future natural calamities as well.
The Minister said that while there were various views among the council members, all states agreed that something must be done to address the devastating Kerala floods and similar calamities in the future.
“One view expressed in the Council was ‘Must the entire burden be borne by the people of the state suffering from natural calamities?’. There was a counterview that this defies the one-nation one-tax principle,” Jaitley said.
He added another view was whether there should be an all-India levy and should it be confined only to some luxury and sin products or on all products.
“There was also a discussion on if the cess should be imposed in the case of all natural calamities or if there should be a distinction. For example, if one or two districts of a state are affected, should there be a levy in that case,” he said.
The Minister said there was a need to have best legal methodologies to address the issue while keeping the constitutional provisions in mind.
He said there was currently a provision to have earmarked funds for natural calamities on state as well as national level in the form of State Disaster Relief Fund (SDRF) and National Disaster Relief Fund (FDRF) which have nothing to do with taxes.
Jaitley said the GoM would also consider if the SDRF and NDRF mechanism were sufficient to address the issue or if more was needed to be done.