Asserting that the present Goods and Services Tax (GST) structure has ‘wrecked the economy,’ former Finance Minister P. Chidambaram said on Friday that it needs to be scrapped and replaced with a simplified GST 2.0.
Addressing a joint press conference with Congress communications chief Jairam Ramesh on the fifth anniversary of the GST’s launch, Mr. Chidambaram said the indirect tax, in its present form, had led to a complete breakdown of trust between the Centre and the States and destroyed the micro, medium and small enterprises (MSME) sector that provides 90 per cent of the jobs. Its complexities had forced the government to “change the rules every two days”, he said.
