Union Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chowdhary with Union Minister of Finance and Corporate Affairs Nirmala Sitharaman. file. , photo credit: Kamal Narang
Government on 20 December informed the Rajya Sabha GST compensation of ₹17,176 crore is pending to states till June 2022.
Responding to supplementary questions during Question Hour, Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chowdhary said the Center is giving GST compensation to states for five years.
He said that even during the time of Covid-19 when no GST was collected, the Government of India had compensated states by taking a loan of ₹1.1 lakh crore and ₹1.59 lakh crore during 2020-21 and 2021-22.
“A total of Rs 17,176 crore GST compensation is pending till June 2022,” the minister told the House.
Responding to other questions, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said, “As of now, as we have cleared all the dues till June to some extent, about ₹17,000 crore dues are to be cleared.”
“The details of GST compensation pending for June 2022 for Tamil Nadu is only Rs 1,200.6148 crore. Utilization Certificate from one state has not been received, which cannot be treated as pending,” he told the House.
In response to another question, he said that education has received more than one lakh crore in 2022-23 and this sector has been given top priority. He also told the House that he and his junior ministers were ready to answer any questions asked by members, but added that “in the process of asking questions, there are panchayats”.
“Let us remember, the Finance Commission has actually asked for direct transfer of funds to local bodies. We have given that. The Prime Minister, in his experience as a Chief Minister, readily agreed to the 14th Finance Commission report. In that, there is money directly. Going to local bodies. They are now sitting on money which can be used for developmental expenditure,” he told the members.
He said that apart from this any program which is run through the cess being collected by the state government or local self government, sometimes the central government from the amount collected through cess on education, health, agriculture infrastructure, roads giving more
“All cesses are being collected for a particular purpose. That particular purpose is clearly being accomplished through the States. There is no doubt that the cesses are being collected by the Centre. But they should not be Can be kept and it has to be spent.” that year on long-term projects, which is only through the states. Obviously, the cesses and surcharges that are collected are only going to the states,” Ms Sitharaman told the House.
“As provided under Article 270 of the Constitution, all taxes and duties specified in the Union List, except duties and taxes, surcharges on taxes and duties and any cess imposed for specific purposes under any law made by Parliament shall be levied and collected by the Government of India and distributed between the Union and the State. The above constitutional provision forms the basis for the collection and utilization of the cess by the Central Government,” the Finance Minister said in his written reply.
She also said that the Center collected 28.1% of the cess and surcharge in gross tax revenue of Rs 25.16 lakh crore in 2021-22.
This was 25.1% of the Rs 20.27 lakh crore gross tax revenue in 2020-21 and 18.2 per cent of the Rs 20.10 lakh crore gross tax revenue in 2019-20, he told the House in his written reply.