India MOF Announces GST Recommendations

The Indian Ministry of Finance Sept. 3 announced recommendations of the country’s GST Council. The announcement includes measures to: 1) exempt GST on individual life and health insurance policies, and individual health reinsurance policies; 2) reduce the number of GST tiers from four to two to introduce a Simple Tax structure with an 18 percent standard rate and a 5 percent merit rate; 3) introduce a 40 percent demerit rate for specified supplies of goods and services; 4) reduce to 5 percent from 12 percent and 18 percent the GST rates for coffee, chocolate, and specified packaged foods; and 5) ...