GST AND ITS IMPACT ON INDIAN ECONOMY

The Goods and Services Tax (GST), India's biggest tax reform since Independence, was rolled out past midnight on Friday at a gala event organised in the Parliament's Central Hall. A minute after the stroke of midnight, President Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Narendra Modi pressed the button to launch the new indirect tax regime on a digital screen with 'GST' emblazoned on it in a golden hue.

Conceived on the principle of 'one nation, one tax, one market', the tax that subsumes 17 central and state levies was launched in the presence of Vice President Hamid Ansari, former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda, Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, MPs, chief ministers, state finance ministers, officials of the Centre and states.The movement of goods will now become much simpler across the country and cheaper as the new regime replaces the old system, where a product was taxed multiple times and at different rates.