One year of GST: Hasmukh Adhia says tax entered smooth phase in just 12 months

Finance secretary Hasmukh Adhia on Tuesday said goods and services tax (GST) has entered a “smooth phase” within a year of its rollout, with “pretty good” tax compliance and the efforts will now be to simplify tax return forms.

The biggest tax reform since Independence, the GST was rolled out on July 1, 2017. The average monthly compliance of return filing and tax payment is going up in a staggered manner and over a period it is expected to be around 96%, Adhia said.

Adhia, in an interview on one year of GST, listed out the benefits of the new tax regime saying it has reduced plethora of taxes, removed cascading effect of taxation and state check post, increased taxpayer base with much less possibility of evasion and brought about end-to-end electronic filing.

“Of course, for any new system, there will always be initial glitches. These glitches were also mainly on account of lack of information and so the moment information gap was removed, people felt more comfortable. I think all the glitches are over and we are in a smooth phase of implementation,” said Adhia, who also holds the charge of revenue secretary.

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Asked what would be the focus in the second year of the goods and services tax regime, the finance secretary said the tax officers are working on a single page return form which will be modular in nature and “user-friendly”.