The introduction of Goods and Services Tax (GST) in India has
evoked an unprecedented range of emotions such as excitement about
the concept, curiosity about its impact on business, uncertainty
about its effective date, apprehension about the manner of
implementation and increased eagerness about the legal and
political manoeuvres to transition to the GST regime.
Currently, through multiple rounds of discussions between the
Central government, state governments and all stakeholders, a
number of prerequisites for GST have fallen in place. The
government has, set post GST Council meeting of 16 January 2017,
set 1 July 2017 as the target date of GST implementation.
While the Finance Minister did not specify a definitive way
forward in his Union Budget speech, he stated that the preparation
of Information Technology (IT) systems for GST is on schedule and
that extensive efforts to reach-out to trade and industry will
start from 1 April 2017. The Finance Minister also
