Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman meets News Broadcasters Federation, NBF seeks parity in GST with newspapers
17 January, 2020 | newsx bureau
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman conducted a meeting with the News Broadcasters Federation (NBF) members. The meeting was attended by a popular TV journalist Arnab Goswami, the Vice Presi...
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman met members of the executive body of the News Broadcasters Federation (NBF) on Friday, January 17, 2020. In the meeting, the NBF handed over a recommendation requesting for parity on GST with the newspaper industry.
As of now, GST on the print media stands at 5% whereas the news broadcasters are charged 18% GST.
In the meeting, the President of NBF Arnab Goswami highlighted the need for parity given the similarity in the business model and the importance of TV news broadcasting in the country.
The Finance Minister accepted a copy of the recommendation of NBF and assured the members that she would look into the matter.
The NBF was represented in the meeting by the TV Channel owner Arnab Goswami, the Vice Presidents Jagi, M Panda and Sanjive Narain, and the Secretary-General R Jai Krishna.
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The Union Budget is all set to take place within a few days. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present the Union Budget. This Union Budget will focus on the relevant push to the economy demand and an expansionary fiscal stance to revive demand.
There are various factors on which this year Budget should be designed. It includes the measures that are important to revive the demand, investment and growth. Her measures should be directed towards a positive if she assures with a commitment to debt sustainability.
The entire budget should determine the expected nominal growth rate. For the uninitiators, all the tax projections are done on the basis of the nominal growth rate. In case the nominal growth rate is over-estimated, tax officials tend to give unrealistic targets. This happened in the previous year. Then tax officials achieve these targets through tax demands and raids. This only takes place followed by fear among investors and individuals.
Both direct taxes such as income and corporate taxes and indirect taxes such as GST rely on the nominal GDP. A realistic assessment of nominal GDP should be done.