Is it true that the GST Council plans to do away with the 5% rate slab? How will it impact the revenues?

With a view to boosting GST revenues, the government has decided to finalize a new plan to make some tweaks to the GST slab rates. For instance, the GST Council is planning to do away with the 5% GST slab. Instead, this slab will either be replaced by the 3% slab or an 8% slab and this would be decided on a case-by-case basis. This is an announcement on which most of the individual states are in sync as it would help them improve the revenues.

In addition, the GST Council will look to prune list of exempt items and transfer many of these so-called necessities to the 3% slab to boost GST revenues. It may be recollected that in the previous year the government had set up a high power panel of state ministers, led by the Karnataka Chief Minister, to suggest ways and means to augment revenues. This was to be done by rationalizing tax rate and removing anomalies, after a series of rate cuts.