GST Bill referred to Select Committee

A Constitution Amendment <g data-gr-id="13">Billw</g> providing for the roll out of long-pending GST was on Tuesday referred to a Select Committee, after the Opposition insisted on its legislative scrutiny of the proposed legislation in the Rajya Sabha where the government faces the numbers crunch.

The 21-member panel will give its report by the last day of the first week of the Monsoon session. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley moved the motion for referring the Bill (The Constitution One Hundred and Twenty-second Amendment Bill, 2014 to the Select Committee.

The Committee constitutes of Bhupender Yadav, Chandan Mitra and Ajay Sancheti (of BJP), Madhusudan Mistry, Mani Shankar Aiyar and Bhalchandra Mungekar (of Congress), Naresh Agrawal (SP), K C Tyagi (JD-U), Derek O'Brien (Trinamool Congress), Satish Chandra Misra (BSP), A Navaneethakrishnan (AIADMK), K N Balagopal (CPI-M), Dilip Kumar Tirkey (BJD), C M Ramesh (TDP), Praful Patel (NCP), Kanimozhi (DMK), Anil Desai (Shiv Sena), Naresh Gujral (SAD), Mohammad Fayaz (PDP), D Raja (CPI), Rajeev Chandrasekhar (Independent).

The GST Bill was approved by Lok Sabha last Wednesday, after a walkout by the Congress. Congress members in Rajya Sabha had made it clear to the government that it will not be possible for them to back the Bill without referring it to a Select Committee.