HT Correspondent
JORHAT, Jan 9: Jorhat MP and deputy leader of the opposition in Lok Sabha, Gaurav Gogoi has sought a new policy on Goods and Services Tax (GST) in the Union budget for the next financial year (2025-26), which will be tabled by the Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on February 1.
Addressing newspersons at the Jorhat District Congress Bhawan on Thursday, Gogoi said that the National Congress (INC) has from time to time been calling for a new GST 2.0 policy in order to provide relief from the heavy tax burden on economically marginalised and middle-class people.
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“There is a strong need for a new GST policy under which there would be a reduction on GST rates to provide relief to the large section of the population who were economically backward,” said Gogoi terming the present GST as “Gabbar Singh tax”.
Stating that the Congress party had in its 2024 Lok Sabha polls manifesto to bring a new GST policy if the party comes to power, Gogoi said that the party has renewed the call for a new GST policy to be announced in the upcoming Union budget.
Elaborating upon the need for a new GST policy the Jorhat MP stated, “The first point is that under the present GST policy, the poor and the middle-class sections of the society, which comprises a large chunk of the population of the country, are bearing a huge tax burden in view of GST imposed on lot of consumable items of daily use.”
Gogoi further pointed out that the economically disadvantaged and middle class were paying more tax under the present GST regime than the rich and privileged.
“In some goods it was 12 per cent and 18 per cent in some other items thereby adversely impacting the lives of the people,” he added.
The MP also quoted data from research and survey reports and said that annually 64 per cent of the GST revenue collected by the Government was from the backward sections of the society.
“In 2020-21, 64 per cent of the total revenue collected under GST came from the bottom 50 per cent of the population and the top 10 per cent of the population paid three per cent,” he stated.
Mentioning that he was a member of the finance committee, he was astonished to see data that showed in the last fiscal year, the middle-class people of the country paid more amount of money under income tax than the total revenue of corporate tax collected from the industrial sector in the entire country.
“Is it an indication of acche din ayenge (Good days are coming) slogan of BJP or vikash (progress) achieved under the Modi-led Government,” Gogoi questioned.
The MP also alleged the Central Government had reduced the Corporation tax for the corporate sector for the benefit of big companies.
“When corporate tax was introduced in 2019 after almost 1.5 lakh crores of revenue was lost by the Central Government,” he alleged.
AICC special observer and a former MLA of Chhattisgarh Vikas Upadhyay along with party office-bearers of Jorhat district were present along with Gogoi during his media address.
