E-way bill system for inter-state movement of goods across the country is likely to be implemented from 1 April with a group of ministers constituted to investigate the technological preparedness of the goods and services tax network (GSTN) proposing its rollout from the new financial year.
The entire infrastructure has been upgraded and additional capacity added by the National Informatics Centre—the agency tasked with the e-way bill infrastructure—to ensure a successful rollout the second time around.
Once e-way bill is rolled out for inter-state movement of goods, after a wait for a couple of weeks intra-state goods movement shall be covered in a phased manner wherein a few states will be added every week.
On simplification of returns filing process, Modi said there was no unanimitywith differences persisting among the various stakeholders.
There is a common consensus that there should be credit matching and the forms should be simplified. There should be one return per month, but they need to take a call on how to simplify the processes for small businesses.
The differences however persist on whether provisional credit should be allowed or not and whether credit should be linked to tax payment or not, more consultation will be done for merging of the different opinions.
The GST Council, headed by Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and comprising his state counterparts, in its next meeting on March 10 will discuss various proposals on return simplification deliberated upon by the GoM.
The initial sales return GSTR-3B will continue for a few more months.