GST Council: meeting will re-assess e-way bill

By

Isabelle Crossley

Published
Mar 8, 2018

The Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council will hold a meeting on Saturday, March 10, to reassess the highly contested e-way bill which may see its implementation pushed back yet again.

The GST Council has previously planned to host a video conference but, with an upgrade of its importance, a meeting will take place this weekend that will allow the Council to discuss current GST issues in person. The meeting will be held in New Delhi and will involve all members of the council.

Some Ministers are calling for the e-way bill’s implementation to be postponed by the Bihar Deputy Chief Minister, Sushil Kumar Modi. The minister stated last month that e-way bills for inter-state shipments could be rolled out as soon as April 1. One main concern is making sure that the IT system that would support the e-way bill is fully operational and protected from potential information leaks and some are still concerned about this.

The diamond jewellery industry was one section of the market that expressed concerns over the functioning of the e-way bill. As diamond jewellery of exceedingly high value is usually transported undercover to avoid theft, the fear is that the e-way bill would provide records of the whereabouts of huge inter-state diamond shipments and so could be hacked with robberies ensuing. Whether or not the diamond jewellery industry could have special exemptions has not been decided.