GST Council sets up GoM on imposing cess in case of disasters
New Delhi, Sep 28 : The GST Council on Friday decided to set up a seven-member Group of Ministers (GoM) headed by Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Modi to look into Kerala's demand for imposing an additional cess over GST to meet the financial requirements in case of a natural calamity.
The other members of the GoM include Himanta Biswa Sarma, T.M. Thomas Isaac, Sudhir Mungantiwar, Sashi Bhusan Behera, Manpreet Singh Badal and Prakash Pant, finance ministers of Assam, Kerala, Maharashtra, Odisha, Punjab and Uttarakhand, respectively.
The GoM, set up to examine the "modalities for revenue mobilisation in case of natural calamities and disasters", would submit its recommendations by October 31 after which another meeting of the GST Council will be called to finalise the course of action.
Earlier, Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, after the GST Council meeting, said that the committee to consider Kerala's proposal for imposition of cess for rehabilitation following a disaster would comprise members from the northeastern, hill and coastal states which are most vulnerable to natural calamities.
He said it was important to have a mature view on the issue instead of acting in haste as this would set a precedent for future natural calamities as well.
The Minister said that while there were various views among the council members, all states agreed that something must be done to address the devastating Kerala floods and similar calamities in future.
"One view expressed in the Council was 'Must the entire burden be borne by the people of the state suffering from natural calamities?'. There was a counterview that this defies the one-nation one-tax principle," Jaitley said.
He added another view was whether there should be an all-India levy and should it be confined only to some luxury and sin products or on all products.
"There was also a discussion on if the cess should be imposed in the case of all natural calamities or if there should be a distinction. For example, if one or two districts of a state are affected, should there be a levy in that case," he said.
The Minister said there was a need to have best legal methodologies to address the issue while keeping the constitutional provisions in mind.
He said there was currently a provision to have earmarked funds for natural calamities at the state as well as the national level in the form of State Disaster Relief Fund (SDRF) and National Disaster Relief Fund (NDRF) which have nothing to do with taxes.
Jaitley said the GoM would also consider if the SDRF and NDRF mechanism were sufficient to address the issue or if more was needed to be done.
"I have been a part of this for five years. Wherever the calamities have happened, the NDRF fund over and above the SDRF has been sufficient in servicing the requirements of the state," Jaitley added.
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Modi govt wants to put caste census in cold storage: Congress
New Delhi (PTI): The Congress on Sunday alleged that the government wants to put the caste census in "cold storage" and that Prime Minister Narendra Modi wants to amend the women's reservation law with the agenda of "misleading" the country.
Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh claimed the Modi government wants to amend Article 334-A on the grounds that the "caste census results will not be available for a few years", overlooking the fact that both Bihar and Telangana completed the comprehensive caste survey in less than six months.
Article 334-A includes the provision that reservation of seats for women would take effect following an exercise of census and delimitation. The government has, however, decided to delink the implementation of the women's quota from the census exercise, which will include caste enumeration, to fast-track it.
"It is clear that the Modi government wants to put the caste census in cold storage," Ramesh claimed on X, dubbing it the "hidden agenda".
There was no immediate response from the government to the Congress' allegations.
Ramesh said that the government had been averse to a caste case and pointed out that on July 20, 2021, it answered a question in Lok Sabha stating that it decided as a matter of policy not to enumerate caste-wise population other than SCs and STs in the Census.
On September 21, 2021, the Modi government filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court that it has taken a conscious policy decision not to conduct a caste census, Ramesh said.
"On April 28, 2024, in a television interview, the Prime Minister accused the Congress of having an urban naxal mindset for championing the cause of a caste census," the Congress leader said.
On April 30, 2025, as the country was still in shock after the Pahalgam terror attack that occurred a few days earlier, the Modi government suddenly announced that the caste census would be conducted as a part of the upcoming census, he said.
Ramesh pointed out that in a widely-reported press conference on March 30, 2026, the Registrar-General and Census Commissioner said most of the results of the ongoing Census 2027 would be available in 2027 itself since the entire Census is being conducted digitally.
"But now the Modi government wants to amend Article 334-A, saying that the caste census results will not be available for a few years - overlooking the fact that both Bihar and Telangana completed the comprehensive caste survey in less than six months," he said.
The prime minister is, as usual, "misleading" the country and engaging in massive deception, Ramesh said.
"He now wants to amend what the Parliament had unanimously passed in September 2023. The hidden agenda is simply not to have the caste census," the Congress general secretary said.
The Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India, Mritunjay Kumar Narayan, at the presser on March 30, had asked people to provide accurate information to census enumerators, asserting that individual data will remain confidential and cannot be used as evidence or to obtain any benefit under any scheme.
Asked about caste being included in the Census and the apprehension that people may not furnish correct information, Narayan said at a press conference the data related to caste will be collected during the second phase, and the questions will be decided after exhaustive discussions.
"Earlier, data was collected on physical paper, which took a lot of time in digitisation. We will start collecting digital data from the outset, so we will be able to issue it very early. Many data sets will be published in 2027," Narayan had said.
The Congress' attack on the government comes days ahead of the three-day sitting of Parliament, during which the government is set to bring bills to implement the Women's Reservation Act before the 2029 parliamentary polls and increase the number of Lok Sabha seats to 816, with 273 reserved for women.
The Congress has accused the Modi government of playing politics in the name of the women's reservation law and asserted that the proposed delimitation exercise linked to it was "not constitutional" and could have "grave consequences" that warrant thorough deliberation after the ongoing assembly polls.
At a Congress Working Committee meeting, it was decided that Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge would call a meeting of top leaders of all opposition parties, most likely on April 15, to discuss and formulate a joint strategy for the "special session" of Parliament from April 16 to 18.
In a letter to the prime minister, Kharge has said it would be "impossible" to have any useful discussion on the women's quota law without details of delimitation and other aspects, and demanded that an all-party meeting be called on the matter after the current round of state polls gets over on April 29.
Kharge said that calling Parliament's special sitting amid state polls reinforces the belief that the government is hurrying the implementation of the women's reservation law for "political mileage".
