Bombay HC reserves order on plea for deferring GST roll-out

The Bombay High Court on Thursday reserved its order on a petition seeking deferment of implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST). A division bench of justices V K Tahilramani and Sandeep Shinde reserved its order after hearing arguments on a plea filed by city resident K S Pillai last week, challenging the Union government's decision to roll out the major tax reform in the middle of the financial year.

The Central government has announced that the indirect tax regime will be rolled out at a special meeting to be held in Parliament tomorrow midnight. The petition has urged the high court to direct the Centre to defer implementation of the GST till the beginning of the next financial year. Appearing for the Central government, Additional Solicitor General Anil Singh today told the bench that the decision to implement the GST had been carefully considered by the Parliament and that its implementation was in public interest.

"There is no prohibition in law to prevent the government from implementing any tax reform at any point in the year as long as it has the sanction of the Parliament,"
Singh said. He also told the bench that the Union and the state governments have created help desks, helpline phone numbers and other measures to ensure easy transition.

"The new system entails single registration... it is online, transparent and with reduced paperwork. Over 60 lakh tax payers have already shifted to the new system," Singh said.