Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday appealed to all the political parties to extend their support in passing the GST Bill. While the Congress is undoubtedly exacting revenge for all the times the BJP didn’t allow Parliament to function-minister of state for finance Jayant Sinha has justified the BJP’s stand saying Parliament was blocked only when there were major scams involved-it is also true the BJP has not been willing to discuss issues threadbare.
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Asked if states would be in readiness to implement GST from April 2016 if the bill does not get passed in the ongoing session of Parliament, Mani said, “we have to speed up everything, every state need to cooperate to meet the deadline”.
“The government observes that in the pretext of Sushma Swaraj, the real motive of the Congress is that they don’t want the GST Bill to be passed”. The government is not being allowed to speak.
Jaitley said the Congress’s priority had never been to strengthen the economy of the country.
On the other hand, Mulayam Singh Yadav urged, “Why don’t members from both sides sit for a discussion and solve the impasse?”
“We want the House to run”.
Later, at a meeting with the Speaker, Yadav said he was in the favour of the House functioning. “You had demanded that there should be no FDI in multi-brand retail and we ensured that it does not happen”, he said.
Bill 2014 will empower Parliament and state legislatures to frame laws for the imposition of a goods and services tax.
The report of the Rajya Sabha Select Committee was tabled in Parliament last month. The Congress, however, stuck to its position that it would not let the House transact any business, except supplementary demand for grants, till External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and two chief ministers resigned.
Considering the differences in opinion, JPC Chairman SS Ahluwalia decided that the panel should wait till the winter session to submit its report. “They want India’s growth story to suffer and are making a full endeavour in that direction through its disruptionist mode”, said Jaitley.
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Monday’s meeting was expected to evolve consensus on three key provisions including the one on return of unutilised land to its owners after five years and the retrospective clause. The bill was first proposed by Congress during UPA-II, but was unable to pass the bill in their tenure.
