12th GST Council Meeting held on 16th March, 2017 in New Delhi

With the series of GST Meetings, the 12th GST Council Meeting held in New Delhi. The abstract of the meeting is as below:
1: The Draft Bills for the implementation of GST in the States and Union Territories has been approved by the GST Council.
2: Finance Minister Arun Jaitely said, "The GST Council has granted its formal approval to all the five legislations".
3: The GST Council agrees to clear provision to cap the Cess on various goods in the Legislation.
4: The Council has even decided to levy cess on Luxury Cars and Aerated Drinks. However, the ceiling for the Cess on "Sin goods could be much Higher".
5: The Cap would be 135% with respect to Pan Masala. Moreover, in case of Tobaco and Cigarettes, the cap would be 290% or Rs 4,170 per 1000 Cigarette Sticks.
6: Till now, Pan Masala, Chewing Tobacco and Cigarettes, Luxury Cars, Aerated Drinks and Mineral Water, lastly Coal and Ignite, the above five categories have been opted to levy cess on by the GST Council. Moreover, the Council has proposed that a fund with a corpus of around RS 50,000 crore will be created in order to meet the potential liability. Further, an option has been kept to add more items in the respective list in future.
7: Revenue Secretary, Shri Hasmukh Adhia said, "The Council will decide the exact levy. What we have cleared today is the ceiling".
8: The Council has cleared the proposal raised by the Union Commerce Department for the Nil rate to be applied for Goods and Services provided to the Special Economic Zone (SEZ).