GST

"The revenues for the month of January 2022 are 15 per cent higher than the GST revenues in the same month last year and 25 per cent higher than the GST revenues in January 2020," a Finance Ministry statement said. "During the month, revenues from import of goods was 26 per cent higher and the revenues from domestic transaction (including import of services) are 12 per cent higher than the revenues from these sources during the same month last year."

"India can become the world's third-biggest market for televisions, leading to an estimated growth of 15 per cent in the market size, increasing to up to 16 million units annually. We would like to urge the government not to change custom duties, as the industry is moving towards a stable condition," Avneet Singh Marwah, CEO, Super Plastronics Pvt Ltd (SPPL) he said.

Senior industry officials also urged the government to take steps to increase insurance penetration in the country. Even though the GST rates do not form part of the union budget, insurers want an indication towards slashing of the rates on insurance premiums in Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's budget speech.

Poll bound states of Uttar Pradesh will receive Rs 17,056.66 crore, Uttarakhand Rs 1,063.02 crore, Punjab will receive Rs 1,718.16 crore and Goa is going to get Rs 367.02 crore along with all other states. The Government of India had released the first advance instalment of tax devolution amounting to Rs 47,541 crore to states on November 22, 2021.

GST runs contrary to the vision of "Digital India" of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, it said in a statement, and it urged the Finance Minister to set things right in consultation with the GST Council.

After facing strong headwinds during the initial days of the pandemic, the real estate sector has largely managed to come out of the turbulent clouds in 2021. To keep the momentum intact in the high-growth potential realty sector, several developers have requested the government to provide incentives on taxes (both principal and interest) for home loans, on the rental housing segment, and extend some concessions on income from renting of housing properties.

December's collections declined on a sequential basis from Rs 1,31,526 crore reported for November. "The revenues for the month of December 2021 are 13 per cent higher than the GST revenues in the same month last year and 26 per cent higher than the GST revenues in December 2019," the Ministry of Finance said in a statement.

In December 2021, revenues from imports were 36 per cent higher, and the revenues from domestic transactions (including import of services) were 5 per cent higher than the revenues from these sources collected during the same month of 2020.

The GST council justified the new 5% tax on online food aggregators, arguing that such a move will reduce instances of tax invasion by restaurants. The council meeting notification read that “services by cloud kitchens/central kitchens are covered under ‘restaurant service… under section 9(5) of the CGST Act, 2017’,” will attract this tax rate increase minus the input tax credit.

"The GST of Rs 40.5 crore was not paid. Along with interest and penalty, on December 30, a total of Rs 49.2 crore has been recovered from WazirX," a GST official said. "WazirX exchange is managed by Zanmai Labs Pvt. Ltd and cryptocurrency WRX is owned by Binance Investment Co. Ltd, Seychelles. The Goods and Services Tax (GST) officials also found that the rate of commission was different for both the transactions.