The List of Over 200 Items Now Taxed at Lower Rates Under GST

GST Council decides to cut rates on items across all tax slabs, only 50 items now remain in the highest tax slab.

The Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council on Thursday, 16 November, decided to cut the rate of tax on 211 items across all tax slabs, in an effort to rationalise rates under the new indirect tax regime.

...following the 23rd meeting of the GST Council, rates on 178 items in the 28 percent slab were reduced to 18 percent.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley to reporters

Also Read: Linking GST Cuts To Elections ‘Juvenile Politics’, Says Arun Jaitley

These include mass consumption products like chocolate, chewing gum, aftershave, beauty products, powder, detergent, and marble. Only 50 items now remain in the highest tax slab.

The Council Also Decided on the Following Changes

• Rates on two items to be reduced from 18 percent to 12 percent. These include wet grinders and armoured fighting vehicles.
• Rates on 13 items reduced from 18 percent to 12 percent.
• Rates on six items reduced from 18 percent to 5 percent.
• Rates on eight items reduced from 12 percent to 5 percent.
• Rates on six items reduced from 5 percent to zero.

The new rates will apply from November 15.

Cheer for Customers

Consumer goods companies such as Hindustan Unilever and Mondelez India said they will pass on the benefits of the lower taxes to consumers.

Tax rate on furniture was lowered from 28 percent to 18 percent. Online furniture marketplace Pepperfry said it will pass on the benefit to consumers.

Also Read: What Brokerages Made Of The Big GST Rate Changes

I think it is a great move, especially from the standpoint of MSME (small businesses) who contribute the bulk of furniture manufacturing in India. Such a move will help make their businesses more competitive and therefore enable business in the furniture space to thrive. 

Ambareesh Murthy, founder, Pepperfry

List of 211 Items for Which the Council Cut Rates Today

From 28 percent to 18 percent

• Wire, cables, insulated conductors, electrical insulators, electrical plugs, switches, sockets, fuses, relays, electrical connectors
• Electrical boards, panels, consoles, cabinets etc for electric control or distribution
• Particle/fibre boards and plywood. Article of wood, wooden frame, paving block
• Furniture, mattress, bedding and similar furnishing
• Trunk, suitcase, vanity cases, brief cases, travelling bags and other hand bags, cases
• Detergents, washing and cleaning preparations
• Liquid or cream for washing the skin
• Shampoos; Hair cream, Hair dyes (natural, herbal or synthetic) and similar other goods; henna powder or paste, not mixed with any other ingredient;
• Pre-shave, shaving or after-shave preparations, personal deodorants, bath preparations, perfumery, cosmetic or toilet preparations, room deodorisers
• Perfumes and toilet waters
• Beauty or make-up preparations
• Fans, pumps, compressors
• Lamp and light fitting
• Primary cell and primary batteries
• Sanitary ware and parts thereof of all kind
• Articles of plastic, floor covering, baths, shower, sinks, washbasins, seats, sanitary ware of plastic
• Slabs of marbles and granite
• Goods of marble and granite such as tiles
• Ceramic tiles of all kinds
• Miscellaneous articles such as vacuum flasks, lighters,
• Wrist watches, clocks, watch movement, watch cases, straps, parts
• Article of apparel & clothing accessories of leather, guts, furskin, artificial fur and other articles such as saddlery and harness for any animal
• Articles of cutlery, stoves, cookers and similar non electric domestic appliances
• Razor and razor blades
• Multi-functional printers, cartridges
• Office or desk equipment
• Door, windows and frames of aluminium.
• Articles of plaster such as board, sheet,
• Articles of cement or concrete or stone and artificial stone,
• Articles of asphalt or slate,
• Articles of mica
• Ceramic flooring blocks, pipes, conduit, pipe fitting
• Wall paper and wall covering
• Glass of all kinds and articles thereof such as mirror, safety glass, sheets, glassware
• Electrical, electronic weighing machinery
• Fire extinguishers and fire extinguishing charge
• Fork lifts, lifting and handling equipment,
• Bull dozers, excavators, loaders, road rollers,
• Earth moving and levelling machinery,
• Escalators,
• Cooling towers, pressure vessels, reactors
• Crankshaft for sewing machine, tailor’s dummies, bearing housings, gears and gearing; ball or roller screws; gaskets
• Electrical apparatus for radio and television broadcasting
• Sound recording or reproducing apparatus
• Signalling, safety or traffic control equipment for transports
• Physical exercise equipment, festival and carnival equipment, swings, shooting galleries, roundabouts, gymnastic and athletic equipment
• All musical instruments and their parts
• Artificial flowers, foliage and artificial fruits
• Explosive, anti-knocking preparation, fireworks
• Cocoa butter, fat, oil powder,
• Extract, essence ad concentrates of coffee, miscellaneous food preparations
• Chocolates, Chewing gum / bubble gum
• Malt extract and food preparations of flour, groats, meal, starch or malt extract
• Waffles and wafers coated with chocolate or containing chocolate
• Rubber tubes and miscellaneous articles of rubber
• Goggles, binoculars, telescope,
• Cinematographic cameras and projectors, image projector,
• Microscope, specified laboratory equipment, specified scientific equipment such as for meteorology, hydrology, oceanography, geology
• Solvent, thinners, hydraulic fluids, anti-freezing preparation

Also Read: Government Wants New MRP on 200 Goods Amid GST Change

From 28 percent to 18 percent

• Condensed milk
• Refined sugar and sugar cubes
• Pasta
• Curry paste, mayonnaise and salad dressings, mixed condiments and mixed seasoning
• Diabetic food
• Medicinal grade oxygen
• Printing ink
• Hand bags and shopping bags bags of jute and cotton
• Hats (Knitted or crocheted)
• Parts of agricultural, horticultural, forestry, harvestings or threshing machinery
• Specified parts of sewing machine
• Spectacle frames
• Furniture wholly made of bamboo or cane

From 18 percent to 5 percent

• Puffed rice chikki, peanut chikki, sesame chikki, revdi, tilrevdi, khaza, kazuali, groundnut sweets gatta, kuliya
• Flour of potato put up in unit container bearing a brand name
• Chutney powder
• Fly ash
• Sulphur recovered in refining of crude
• Fly ash aggregate with 90% or more fly ash content

Also Read: GST Rates Lowered For Restaurants

From 12 percent to 5 percent

• Dessicated coconut
• Narrow woven fabric
• Idli, dosa batter
• Finished leather, chamois and composition leather
• Coir cordage and ropes, Jute twine, coir products
• Fishing net and fishing hooks
• Worn clothing
• Fly ash brick

From 5 percent to nil

• Guar meal
• Hop cone
• Certain dried vegetables, such as sweet potatoes, maniac
• Fish frozen or dried
• Unworked coconut shell
• Khandsari sugar

(This article was first published in BloombergQuint)