As GST Turns 1, Prime Minister Narendra Modi Says GST Has Brought Growth, Simplicity, Transparency

The government has announced July 1 as 'GST Day', to mark the first anniversary of the launch of the new indirect tax regime.

Goods and Services Tax: Firms with annual turnover of less than Rs. 20 lakh are exempted from GST.

As GST or Goods and Services Tax completes one year today, several Union ministers including Prime Minister Narendra Modi took to microblogging site Twitter to hail the achievements under the current indirect tax regime. PM Modi described GST as a tool that has brought growth, simplicity and transparency. The government has announced July 1 as 'GST Day', to mark the first anniversary of the launch of the new indirect tax regime. "One nation, one tax and one market due to GST has led to economic growth, simplicity for people and transparency in the economy," said finance minister Piyush Goyal.

Former finance minister Arun Jaitley also took the occasion and tweeted that GST has resulted in increased formalisation and greater tax compliance. Mr Jaitley said total tax base has increased. The first quarter of FY19 shows that personal income tax collection has increased 45 per cent.

In the last one year, 48 lakh firms have been added with GST and 350 crores of invoices have been processed, according to the Prime Minister's official Twitter account. The number of returns filed stand at over 11 crore and the number of E-Way bills generated at over 10 crore, it noted.

The tweet also mentioned some other achievements of the GST:

Opportunities for small and medium enterprises: Businesses with annual turnover of less than Rs. 20 lakh are exempted from GST, and entities with annual turnover of Rs. 1.5 crore need to file return in GSTR 1 form only on quarterly basis.

On ease of doing business, it said that more than Rs. 45,000 crore of GST refunds have been disposed off till date.