The Former Chief Economic Advisor Arvind Subramanian has hinted that petrol, diesel products cannot be brought under the ambit of the Goods and Services Tax ( GST ) until the revenue stabilizes.
“You know it is desirable to have that (inclusion of petrol and diesel in GST). There is a good economic explanation or fiscal explanation for why it is not easy. Because if you put petroleum products into GST, naturally you will have a loss of revenues,” Subramanian said at an interactive session at ‘Mathan’, a platform for thought leaders, here.
“Because it is (a) widely-used intermediate input. And, therefore, the thinking was that the GST revenues have to stabilize before that can be brought in, because you need to have enough other revenues to cushion for the loss of putting petroleum into the GST,” Subramanian said, while replying to a query on why petroleum products are not included in the GST.
According to Subramanian, India is important in the international context despite it shows a slowdown in the growth.
“India is still the place of dynamism in the sense that the most important hope is that our children’s lives will be better than us,” he said.
The GST needs to be improved in terms of many things, so there are many many challenges ahead for the economy, Subramanian said.
Subramanian, however, declined to answer a query on the resignation of Urjit Patel as the Reserve Bank of India governor.
