Budget 2012: Government keen on early enactment of DTC Bill

Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Friday expressed firm commitment to enact the Direct Taxes Code (DTC) Bill at the earliest, after expeditious examination of the report of the Parliamentary Standing Committee.

The Bill was introduced in Parliament in August 2010, and was to come into force from April 1 this year. However, the timeline could not be adhered to as the report of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on the matter was received only on March 9 this year.

Similarly, Mukherjee said that the Constitution Amendment Bill, a preparatory step in the implementation of Goods and Services Tax (GST) was introduced in Parliament last March 2011 and is before the Parliamentary Standing Committee.

He said till the recommendations of the Committee were received, drafting of model legislation for Centre and State GST in consultation with different States was going on.

Finance Minister Mukherjee said that the structure of GST Network (GSTN) has been approved by the Empowered Committee of State Finance Ministers, GSTN will be set up as a National Information Utility and will become operational by August 2012.

The GSTN will implement common PAN-based registration, returns filing and payments processing for all States on a shared platform. The use of PAN as a common identifier in both direct and indirect taxes, will enhance transparency and check tax evasion.