Exemptions, incentives and GST don’t go together: Teaotia

Kolkata, Aug 20 (PTI) Commerce secretary Rita Teaotiatoday told the exporting community that exemptions andincentives, which were being given for promoting exports wouldgo away once the GST was in place. "Exemptions and incentives will go away once the Goodsand Services Tax (GST) is implemented. GST and exemptions donot go hand-in-hand," Teaotia said at a session organised byEEPC, FIEO and GJEPC here. She said the department of revenue was getting all thesuggestions and representing from various quarters on theprobable impact of GST on exports. "The commerce department is not involved with the GSTlegislation. We will give our inputs to the finance departmentbefore everything gets finalised," the official said. Saying that many countries across the world were resortingto protectionist policies to protect insulate their domesticindustries from suffering due to the global slowdown, theIndian government was making efforts to create a conduciveenvironment for making country’s exports competitive. "Programmes like Make in India, Skill India, Digital Indiawere efforts to increase competitiveness of Indian exports,"she said. Regarding SEZs, she said that the government was committedto this sector. "We will align our policies in tune with the GST. Ourinterest and concern is to protect the export sector and SEZis important for the country’s economic landscape," she said.PTI DC CR SUSABK