• Notification Date: 06-04-2024
• Notification No: N/A

Congress Party Promises to replace Modi Govt's GST Regime with GST 2.0 to Free the Poor from Tax Burden

In its manifesto ahead of the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, the Congress party has promised that it will replace the current Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime introduced by the Narendra Modi-led BJP government with GST 2.0, with rates that will not burden the poor. 

"Congress will replace the GST laws enacted by the BJP/NDA government with GST 2.0. The new GST regime will be based on the universally accepted principle that GST shall be a single, moderate rate (with a few exceptions) that will not burden the poor," Congress said in its manifesto. 

The Congress government has opposed the current GST regime which was introduced by the late Finance Minister Arun Jaitley under the first term of the NDA government for its multiple rates that it claims is a burden on India's poor. 
 
In the past Congress has claimed that GST under Modi government had serious birth defects and the manner of their implementations have "wrecked the economy." 

The idea of GST was also propagated by the UPA government which governed the country for two terms between 2004-2014 under Prime Minister Manmohan Singh when P Chidambaram was the Finance Minister. 
 
It claimed that NDA's GST which is in force today was not the GST which was envisaged by the UPA government. 

"The GST that we have today is a complex web of many rates, conditions, exceptions and exemptions that will leave even an informed taxpayer completely bewildered. Not all registered dealers are informed taxpayers; as a result, they are at the mercy of the tax-collector," Chidambaram had claimed in July 2022. 

GST remained a high point during the last fiscal with collections reaching a record high of Rs 1.87 lakh crore in April 2023 and the second highest collection coming in at Rs 1.78 lakh crore in March 2024.