New Delhi, October 13
The government today decided to hold the winter session of Parliament from November 16 to December 16, advancing the dates by over a week to prepare for the scheduled rollout of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime from April 1 next year.
The Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs headed by Home Minister Rajnath Singh approved the advancement of the session at its meeting today.
The winter session normally commences on November 24 to 26 every year and concludes on December 23 in time for Christmas and New Year festivities. The break from tradition was seen in 2011 when the Lokpal and Lokayuktas Bill was passed by the Lok Sabha on December 27 and subsequently tabled in the Rajya Sabha on December 29.
Government sources said the session this year had been advanced with the purpose of meeting the April 1 deadline for the rollout of the GST regime across the country.
With the Presidential assent to the Constitutional Amendment Bill granted, the next logical step in taking the tax reform forward is the passage of the Central GST and Integrated GST Bills in Parliament.
The two Bills are being drafted and the Government’s target is to pass them in winter session before November-end.
“The government wants to conclude the legislative business around GST before November so that the Bills can be gazetted and then the government has ample time for undertaking executive action ahead of GST rollout from April. There is a lot of executive action to be taken before this biggest tax reform legislation becomes a reality,” a source in Parliament said.
The government earlier met the deadline of ratification of the Constitutional Amendment (122nd) Bill ahead of time. As against a month it had kept for ratification of the Bill by half of the states, the government achieved the target in 23 days as recently acknowledged by Revenue Secretary Hasmukh Adhia. Subsequent to ratification of the Bill by 50 per cent of the states, the government acquired Presidential assent for the Bill, BJP’s major economic goal.