GST: Upbeat Marathe sees not much impact on co-ops

“If GST is good for the country it cannot be otherwise for cooperatives”, said Satish Marathe, Patron of Sahakar Bharati. Cooperative is a part of the nation’s economic milieu and it is sure to benefit the sector in the long run, he said lauding the launching of what he called “revolutionary tax system”.

Marathe, however, admitted that the process of implementation of GST is going to give rise to the usual teething problems in the months to come. “It would take a year to stabilize when we can hope to reap the benefits out of this new tax regime”, underlined the senior cooperator.

Coming to the specifics of the urban cooperative banking sector Marathe said he sees no change in their operations. “UCBs were already charging service tax and I see as such no change in this. There was a lack of clarity in the beginning over tax on the recovery of advances but even that has been cleared. The Govt does not plan to levy any fresh tax on the recoveries”, underlined Marathe.

On the issue of GST on fertilizer Sahakar Bharati leader felt that the govt should keep it at its past level. There were taxes on them historically and I would expect the govt to keep it at that, Marathe stated.

Marathe, however, felt the issues of farmers are mostly related to lengthening the shelf life of their produce and quoted statistics from foreign countries to prove his point. “While the US is able to process 80% of agri produce we in Indian do that with just 10%”, he lamented.

It bears recall that Goods and Services Tax was launched at midnight at Parliament’s Central Hall by President Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Narendra Modi replacing a slew of indirect taxes with a unified tax.