Panaji: Chief minister Pramod Sawant welcomed the reforms announced at the 57th meeting of the GST council, saying the measures would help address challenges taxpayers had faced earlier.The council adopted recommendations on process reforms, focusing mainly on registration, returns, refunds, and adjudication.A key recommendation is to amend the CGST Act, 2017 to set an upper limit of Rs 40 crore — Rs 20 crore under CGST and Rs 20 crore under SGST/UTGST — on the pre-deposit required to file an appeal before the appellate authority or the appellate tribunal, respectively, in cases where an order involves only a penalty and no tax demand. The move is expected to ease the financial burden on taxpayers and make it simpler to access appellate remedies in such matters.Sawant attended the meeting, which was chaired by Union minister for finance and corporate affairs Nirmala Sitharaman at Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi.Chief ministers from Delhi, Goa, Haryana, Jammu & Kashmir, Karnataka, Keralam, Maharashtra, and Meghalaya were present, along with finance ministers from various states and senior officials.
