Kolkata May 25 (IANS) The World Gold Council on Thursday said the enforcement of hallmarking is key along with implementation of Goods and Services Tax (GST) to bring the transparency in the trade of the yellow metal.
The World Gold Council also bats for a substantially low GST rate. At its recent meeting the GST Council could not reach a consensus on the GST rate to apply on gold and will meet again on June 3 in New Delhi to decide this.
With the implementation of GST it is important that the hallmarking is also enforced. Our view is that regardless of how the announcement comes within the next 18-24 months we should have a complete extension of hallmarking. We are for mandatory hallmarking said Somasundaram PR Managing Director India World Gold Council.
Asked about the possible GST rate on gold he said: Today the (tax) rate is around 12.5 per cent. Better thing is to keep the rates substantially low and to incentivise the moving of entire trade into a more transparent and compliance systems... something around 50 per cent off (the current rate).
He said operational issues in the entire supply chain of gold which is complicated itself need to be clarified.
There is no clarity on the GST rate on gold and also on operational issues. One-third of jewellers business in India is gold for gold. Operational complexity appears to be high under the GST unless it is clarified Somasundaram said.
Traders have different interpretation as of now he added after the launch of Bengali version of a WGC s report -- India s Gold Market: evolution and innovation here.
Adding that the GST would be a big success for the industry he said whatever be the rate it would take 12-18 months for the industry to settle down.
We believe the GST will get gold out of shadow of black money and in the long term we are going to see a big jump in the way we sell and export gold. If the system is perfected the smuggling is going to get harder he said.
The objective of the implementation of the GST is to bring the transparency in gold buying he added.
--IANS
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Enforce hallmarking with implementation of GST: World Gold Council
