India's GST reforms 2025 - growth for all

WHILE delivering his address during India's Independence Day on August 15, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced that the government of India would bring Next-Generation reforms of the Goods and Services Tax (GST), which will bring down the tax burden on the common man.

- RUBY JASPREET

Keeping on that promise, the GST Council approved Next-Gen GST reforms on September 3, bringing in a significantly simplified system with lower tax rates. This lowering of taxes will directly benefit the common man, farmers, MSMEs, women, youth, and middle-class families, while strengthening India's long-term growth.

Introduced for the first time on July 1, 2017, GST is India's most significant indirect tax reform since Independence. The GST brings multiple central and state taxes into a single, unified system.

This comprehensive reform package, dubbed GST 2.0, will now have a simplified two-slab structure of 5% and 18%. This simplification is coupled with sweeping rate reductions across sectors, with a focus on sectors that affect the common man. The reforms will be effective from September 22.The tax reductions are aimed at benefiting the labour-intensive industries, farmers as well as the agriculture and the health sectors.