The Goods and Services tax Council on Saturday approved the roll out of the E-Way Bill across the country from April 1 and also extended the GSTR-3B form for another three months till June 30.
Additionally, all pending claims of refunds of exporters are expected to be cleared by March 31.
Announcing the decisions, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, who chairs the GST Council, said that the E-Way Bill for inter-state movement will come into effect from April 1.
“After that, every week a few States will start E-Way Bill for intra-state movement as well, so that it is started in a phased manner,” Jaitley told reporters.
The E-Way Bill would be launched across the country by June 1.
GST Returns
The Minister also said that a decision on a simplified tax form is yet to be taken as apart from the option already under discussion, an officers committee also presented an alternate model for GST returns to the Council.
“The system is a single monthly return, which is simple but not evasion prone. The view was that it should be further simplified,” he said.
The Group of Ministers led by Bihar Deputy Finance Minister along with IT experts will now discuss how to simplify it further.
The GST Council also extended the reverse charge mechanism and TDS and TCS provisions for three months or till June 30.
Experts welcomed the move and said a staggered E-Way Bill will be helpful.
“The decision to implement EWB from April 1 for inter-state and to stagger intra-state is a welcome step. As GST return filing is taking time to stabilise, EWB can help detect and reduce tax evasion. The staggered implementation is also good development as hopefully the portal will be able to iron out teething issues,” said Archit Gupta, Founder & CEO ClearTax.
“The government believes the E-Way would be a very important measure to rein in tax evasion and hence they don't want to defer it any further," said Abhishek Jain, Tax Partner, EY.
Exporters’ refunds: The Council has also extended tax exemptions to exporters for six months.