India Wants a Nationwide Sales Tax
Prime Minister Modi has an alternative to cumbersome state levies.
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Prime Minister Narendra Modi took power in May 2014, promising to make India a better place for business. Investors are still waiting. Stymied by opponents who control key parts of the government and distracted by controversies such as attacks on Muslims suspected of killing cows, Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has made good on only a few reforms.
His team says 2016 will be different. Modi faces an April 1 target for the launch of a nationwide goods and services tax (GST) that will do away with state sales taxes. The percentage rate of the new tax will be in the mid- to high teens.