Form GSTR-2 reflects purchases made by a business whereas GSTR-3 is a combination of sales and purchases.
The deadline to file GSTR-2 was Tuesday whereas the last date for filing GSTR-3 was November 10.
"To facilitate trade, the last date for filing GSTR-2 and GSTR-3 for July 2017 has been extended to November 30 and December 11 respectively," a government tweet said.
"A notification in this regard will be issued to facilitate about 30.81 lakh taxpayers for filing GSTR-2 for July," the Finance Ministry tweeted.
The decision comes after the Group of Ministers headed by Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi met on October 28 in Bengaluru to review the issues faced under the Goods and Services Tax filings.
GST expert Pritam Mahure told IANS: "This extension was necessitated as many technical glitches were cropping up during GSTR-2 filing. In days to come, the government should have well thought out strategy to address GST compliance issues."
It also said that real estate, a major area of tax evasion and black money generation, could soon be brought under GST.
"No extension of time will be given for filing GSTR-3B for September 2017. Please file this by October 20, 2017," the Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) said through notices issued in several national dailies.
"Please file your return at the earliest (positively before Diwali)," CBEC said, referring to the major festival coming up next week, which is also observed as the start of the accounting year by many in the trading community.
The GSTR-3B return is a self-assessment by businesses of their sale and purchases during the period concerned.
"The one sector in India where maximum amount of tax evasion and cash generation takes place and which is still outside GST is real estate. Some of the states have been pressing for it.
"I personally believe that there is a strong case to bring real estate into the GST," Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said on Thursday, while delivering the Annual Mahindra Lecture at Harvard University in the US.
He said, the issue would be taken up at the next meeting of the GST Council scheduled for November 9.
Petroleum products, alcohol and real estate are three sectors which are still outside the GST since several states are opposing their inclusion in the new pan-India indirect tax regime.
"Currently, the GSTN system is working smoothly and accepting more than 80,000 GSTR-3B returns per hour," Pandey told reporters here.
Till September 16, 3.5 lakh taxpayers had filed GSTR-3B returns for August, he said.
September 20 was the last date for filing the GSTR-3B forms, a summary return of details of outward supplies, inward supplies, credit and payment of Goods and Services Tax.
Last month, the government announced a five-day extension for filing the GSTR-3B form till August 25, after the GSTN return filing portal was hit by a technical glitch and stopped functioning, a day ahead of the last date for filing.
Thus, traders across the country faced problems and could not file their returns.
Technical issues again earlier this month forced the government to extend the deadline for filing the GST sales return -- GSTR-1 -- for another five days till September 10.
The GST Council, headed by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, had decided to set up a Group of Ministers (GoM) to sort out the issues hampering the smooth operation of the GSTN portal.
Referring to the technical glitches that have plagued the digital filing of GST returns by businesses, Jaitley on Wednesday blamed it on the last-minute rush to meet the deadline.
"A lot of the GST problem is self-invited by assessees. For example, today (Wednesday) is the last date for filing returns (August), but till last night only 25 per cent had paid their taxes," Jaitley told reporters here.
"So, if 75 per cent of people wait till the last day, the system is bound to crash... its capacity is 1 lakh per hour or 24 lakh throughout the day. Till last night, there was no problem," he added.
Last month, he announced that the government had comfortably met the collection targets for the first month of GST implementation in July.
The Minister said that Rs 92,283 crore in tax had come in by August 29 with 38.38 lakh assessees, or only 64 per cent of those registered, having filed their GST returns. The total number of those registered under the GST who should be filing returns is 59.57 lakh.
"We have kept long deadlines for GST filing. For at least six months the taxpayers have to file their own assessment. There will be no extension later," Revenue Secretary Hasmukh Adhia told reporters here after the first meeting of the Group of Ministers (GOM) that was formed to tackle the IT-related glitches.
The GST Council has allowed businesses to file GSTR-3B, which is a self-assesment of their sale and purchases, till December.
"Initial hiccups are there but no mass scale failure. Initial issues need to be sorted out. We have decided a plan of action. The attempt was to work around the difficulties to eliminate problems, leading to better understanding of all stakeholders," he added.
Bihar Deputy Chief Minister and BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi, who heads the GoM, said that it would be only by October 30 that the government would be able to iron out 70-80 per cent of the technical issues being faced in return filing.
"Taxpayers should not wait for the last day. The general tendency is that people wait for the last day resulting in heavy rush.
"In the last 3-4 days before the deadline there is heavy rush to file returns. I appeal to all the taxpayers that they should not wait for last day. By October 30, 70-80 per cent of problems we will be able to solve," Modi said.
IT services firm Infosys is taking care of the IT infrastructure for GSTN.
GOM was formed at the last meeting of GST Council in Hyderabad after lot of I-T issues concering returns filing were raised by the states.
Modi said that on Friday, a full day meeting of tax officers of state governments was held with the GST Network (GSTN), stakeholders, bankers, tax experts, big corporates and Infosys regarding the glitches faced in filing returns.
The GOM meeting will be held every 15 days, mostly in Bengaluru, with the next meeting scheduled in the first week of October.
Briefing the media after the second review meeting post the Goods and Services Tax roll out, Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said that in consonance with the recommendations of the fitment committee, the tax rates on approximately 30 goods of common utility, including dry tamarind, custard powder, raincoats, rubberbands and batter for idli and dosa, have been reduced.
The pre-GST rates on some of the items were also slashed. The tax on plastic raincoats and rubberbands, for instance, have been reduced from 28 to 18 and 12 per cent respectively.
Jaitley with the changed nature of economy, the government could afford to have the rates of some these items reduced.
Khadi fabric through Khadi and Village Industries Commission Act of 1956 (KVIC) stores will now be exempted under GST.
About the increase in cess rates on automobiles, he said that while status quo has been maintained for small cars (petrol and diesel), hybrid cars and 13-seater vehicles, the Council decided to increase the cess rates for some segments.
GST cess on mid-segment cars has been increased by 2 per cent, for large segment cars it has been increased by 5 per cent and for SUVs by 7 per cent, he said. He claimed that though the space of increase was 10 pe rcent, the Council did not restore the pre-GST rates.
Jaitley said in view of the GST filing portal encountering increasing technical glitches, the Council has decided to set up a five-member ministerial panel to oversee its functioning and smoothen the process.
The return filing date deadline of GSTR-1 for July, that was to end on Sunday, has also been extended by a month till October 10.
"Since the work is huge, the Council decided a new schedule itself for filing returns. Because of the load on the system, we want to give adequate time to taxpayers," Jaitley told reporters after the meeting.
"There are transient challenges in technology. The Council decided to appoint a committee, the composition of which will be announced in a day or two. It will consist of ministers who will interact with GST to ensure a smooth transformation," he said.
The decision was taken after the Council reviewed the functioning of the GST Network (GSTN) platform. A detailed presentation was given to the members by GSTN officials.
Jaitley said the portal did face technical glitches on two-three occasions due to overload.
The eight-hour long meeting was the 21st meeting of the Council.
The council also decided that food items sold under a trademark registered as on May 15, 2017 and also under a name on which exclusivity can be claimed by actionable claim, 5 per cent GST will be charged.
Jaitley said this was done to do away with the disparity created in the trade, as some of the food items sold in open categories had zero GST while branded and packaged had five per cent. He said a section of food industry was getting their registered trademark deregistered and was selling the food items either under a deregistered trademark or under corporate name.
A detailed presentation was with regard to migration of old registrants to GST from earlier regime. On GST revenue collections and distribution of money to the states, he said though the overall collection has been quite robust with more than 70 per cent of the eligible registrants for July filing, the figure of approximately Rs 95,000 crore for July was paid and some spillover of VAT collections of June were also be added
Jaitley said that there is still a very large unutilized IGST, which is used as credit for payment of CGST and SGST and for July out of Rs 48,000 crore IGST, approximately Rs 10,000 crore was adjusted between the Centre and states. He said Rs 37,000 crore is still lying which will be used in subsequent months.
The GST annual return in the two forms was to be filed by September 30, 2020. This now stands extended till October 31.
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As the decision is coming when elections in Bihar have been announced, the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) took approval of the Election Commission before announcing the changes.
"After obtaining due clearances from the Election Commission in view of the Model Code of Conduct, Government has extended due date for furnishing Annual Return in GSTR-9 and GSTR 9C for 2018-19 from 30.09.2020 to 31.10.2020," a tweet from CBIC said.
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The extension of annual return filing has come as much needed relief for GST taxpayers. Along with compliance on GSTR-9 and 9C, taxpayers were also required to follow e-invoicing regulations. The industry had said that complying with both regulations would be difficult.
(IANS)