Uttarakhand: Premchand Agarwal got big responsibility amidst controversies, nominated as GoM member

Uttarakhand Finance Minister Premchand Agarwal has been nominated as a member of the Group of Ministers (GoM) for raising revenue in case of natural disasters. Minister Premchand Agarwal has expressed his gratitude to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman for this important responsibility.

The GST Council has constituted a group of ministers to impose a special disaster cess in case of a natural disaster in a state. This seven-member group of ministers includes Uttar Pradesh Finance Minister Suresh Kumar Khanna, Uttarakhand Finance Minister Premchand Agarwal, Ajanta Neog of Assam, OP Choudhary from Chhattisgarh, Kanubhai Desai from Gujarat, KN Balagopal from Kerala and Chandrima Bhattacharya from West Bengal.

The members of the Group of Ministers will examine the constitutional and legal imposition of special cess by the states to raise revenue in case of natural disaster or disasters. The purpose of this is to examine and identify the framework used by the states to classify an event as a natural disaster for the purpose of imposing such special cess under the GST system.

Apart from this, it should be examined whether any alternative mechanism can be created to help the states in case of natural disaster without changing the GST basic structure. It should also be examined whether the special cess should be limited to some specific sectors or should be implemented on all sectors.