Finance Ministry to Start to Pre-Budget 2018 Work Soon

Work on India’s first post-GST Union Budget 2018-19 will start next week with the finance ministry issuing timelines for different processes that will culminate with its presentation in February.

It may also be the current government's last full-fledged Budget as general elections are due in 2019. Even though independent India's biggest tax reform of GST was implemented from July 1, the Budget for 2017-18 (April- March), had followed the practice of tax revenue projections under the heads of customs duty, central excise and service tax alongside direct tax numbers.

With excise duty and service tax being subsumed in the Goods and Services Tax (GST), the classifications will undergo change, an official said.

While a new classification for revenues to be accrued from GST will be included in the Budget for next fiscal, for the current year two sets of accounting may be presented - one for actual accruals during April-June for excise, customs and service tax, and the other for July-March period for GST and customs duty.

The official said that since the GST rates are decided by a GST Council, headed by Union Finance Minister and comprising  representatives of all states, the Budget for 2018-19 will not have any tax proposals concerning excise and service tax levies.