GST to increase tax points for the IT industry: Nasscom

The information technology (IT) and information technology-enabled services (ITeS) industry body Nasscom has said that the goods and services tax (GST) Bill would streamline the taxation system and make it much more transparent but would also increase the tax points for the industry, which will be a 'challenge' for the IT industry.

R Chandrasekhar, president of Nasscom has said that the GST Bill is good for the country, which will improve efficiencies, streamline taxation, transparency, as it is implemented on an IT platform. The single unified tax regime will create a rational tax regime. However, they have some concerns with the GST Model Law and not the Bill.

IT services are intangible,” R Chandrasekhar said “We have number of concerns which have been shared with the government. Today, we have a simple regime, one single point of taxation which is the central service tax, one single point of registration, one single invoice and one single place where you have to go for any refund. Now under GST regime, it could be as high as 111 points, because you have CGST, IGST, SGST, then we have 36 states and Union territories, all put together it becomes 111 different tax points.' He added that moving from single to multiple points could be a challenge from the point of view of ease of doing business.

According to the Nasscom president, all the key service sectors would be impacted by the Constitution amendment Bill. He also said that Industry concerns have already been brought to the notice of Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and the minister assured them that these issues will be looked into.