Govt's self goal on GST bill ?

Goods and Service Tax or GST bill , which looked like a dream meant to be realised soon - now is being royally delayed due to certain unexpected and unwarranted steps taken by BJP when it comes to helping pass the bill taking its main opposition party  - Congress into confidence. 

According to media reports Congress is not happy with BJP's Subramaniam Swamy filing a case against former Haryana CM BS Hooda in the National Herald case which involves Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi. Congress has alleged that it is willing to support the GST bill, originally proposed by Congress, in the interest of the nation but BJP is playing vendetta games politically. The timing of such a move by a BJP member, when Congress was willing to support the bill , raises questions on intentions of BJP itself. 

Several parties including Shiv Sena , Janata- Dal United  and Biju Janata Dal have accused the BJP of ruining its chances of passing the historic bill. 

The story doing rounds is that with clearance of GST bill several leaders in BJP believe that the inflation will rise and with upcoming elections the price rise will be a serious issue. It will be a major risk to knowingly allow such an adversity to possibly affect elections' outcomes. There is a trend that is emerging when it comes to GST bill and equation between BJP & Congress -  every time congress party tries to converge on GST bill in order to support the most important tax reform bill, BJP sharpens its attack on the congress leadership i.e Gandhi family.

Now the challenge that remains, apart from the political opposition on building consensus on  the revenue neutral rate at 18 per cent which needs to be constitutionalised as demanded by Congress , is also the dual GST with State Finance Ministers demanding higher per cent share for the states. The State Finance Ministers in a meet with Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Tuesday are expected to ask for a larger share in the pie in the form of SGST ( State Goods and Services Tax). 

Looks like government has scored a self goal when it comes to passing GST bill assuming its fair intention of passing the bill at all.