The meeting of GST Council is underway in New Delhi and this is the 15th meeting of the Council, which comprises Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and state representatives. <br/><br/>This meeting is likely to finalize the rates of tax and cess on gold, biscuits, textiles, footwear and a few other commodities. The meeting of the GST Council is important because it is likely to finalize the rates of tax and cess to be levied on the commodities remaining after the 14th GST Council meeting. <br/><br/>Besides it, the approval of amendments of the draft GST Rules and related forms are also on the agenda of the meeting. The Council may also review tax rates for some goods in view of representations received from industry. <br/><br/>Last month, the GST Council had put over one thousand 200 goods and 500 services in the four tax brackets of 5, 12, 18 and 28 per cent. It had also imposed cess over and above the peak rate of 28 per cent on demerit and luxury goods. <br/><br/>The GST will unify 16 different levies and create an uniform market for seamless movement of goods and services.

The meeting of Goods and Services Tax, GST Council is currently underway in New Delhi . Finance Minister Arun Jaitley who is the Chairman of the Council is chairing the meeting. The crucial three-day meeting of the council will decide on the tax rate and sort out issues like compensation formula for rollout of the new indirect tax regime from 1st of April next year. <br/><br/>The GST Council is a joint forum of the Centre and the States. The meeting will also deliberate on the vexed issue of the Centre retaining power to assess 11 lakh service tax filers under the new dispensation. At its previous meeting last month, the GST Council had approved five sets of draft rules in its second meeting. <br/><br/>The draft rules are related to registration, payment, refund, returns and invoices of debit and credit notes. The finance ministry will try and reach a consensus on the key issues so that the subsequent central GST (CGST) and integrated GST (IGST) legislations could be introduced in the month-long Winter Session of Parliament beginning November 16.