CA Notes & Updates : Commerce Updates

57th GST Council Meeting Recommends Major Compliance Relief - Arrest Powers Scrapped, Prosecution Threshold Raised to Rs 5 Crore Brief Summary of Key Recommendations: 1. Enforcement Reforms: - Power of arrest under GST law is being removed completely. - Prosecution threshold raised from Rs 1 crore to Rs 5 crore. - General penalty reduced from Rs 25,000 to Rs 10,000 where no specific penalty is prescribed. - No GST demand notice will be issued where tax amount is below Rs 10,000. 2. Faster Refunds and Working Capital Relief: - Refund acknowledgement period reduced from 15 days to 10 days. If no acknowledgement or deficiency memo issued in 10 days, refund will be deemed acknowledged. - 90% of refund claims to be system-sanctioned within 3 working days based on risk assessment. - Refund of excess balance in Electronic Cash Ledger to become fully automatic, no officer involvement. - Refund of unutilised ITC on input services under Inverted Duty Structure now allowed. - Refund of ITC on capital goods for exporters allowed at 1/60th per month. 3. Wider Input Tax Credit (ITC): - ITC now allowed on health and life insurance for employees, telecom towers, pipelines outside factory, free samples, and stock written off due to expiry. 4. Simplified Compliance for Small Taxpayers: - Optional simplified scheme for taxpayers with turnover up to Rs 5 crore supplying only to consumers - Annual return filing with quarterly tax payment. - Waiver of late fee for delayed GSTR-3B filing recommended for taxpayers up to Rs 5 crore turnover if filed within same month. - Simplified GST registration for small e-commerce sellers - can sell across states by declaring ECO warehouse as place of business without separate registration in each state. 5. Protection for Genuine Buyers: - Issue of ITC reversal where supplier defaults in chain deferred. Committee of Officers to examine safeguards for genuine buyer having proper invoice, goods received and payment made to supplier. Report in 3 months. 6. Smoother Movement of Goods: - Vehicle carrying goods to be stopped only on specific intelligence, authorised in advance by officer not below Joint Commissioner rank. - During transit, only Source State and Destination State can inspect goods, transit states cannot. 7. Other Important Points: - No change in GST rates. Rate structure declared settled. Future rate revisions to be taken up once a year. - Reforms to be implemented in staggered manner from 1st April 2027. Source: Finance Ministry Briefing post 57th GST Council Meeting. ◈◉◎┄┅══❂❣️❂══┅┄◎◉◈ ┍━━━━━═░★░═━━━━┑   ✪ ➻ https://t.me/canotes                ℑoin us 🔜   ✪ ➻ t.me/canotes_ipcc                ℑoin us 🔜   ✪ ➻ t.me/canotes_final                ℑoin us 🔜   ✪➻ @canotes_foundation ┕━━━━━═░◈░═━━━━┙