The latest meeting of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council deserves to be remembered as one of the most productive in recent years. Ministers representing 31 states and Union Territories were in attendance, and though the session was scheduled for two days, the Council managed to complete its business in just one. That efficiency was no accident.

Careful preparatory work by committees, coupled with a political will to deliver on the Prime Minister’s Independence Day assurance that the GST structure would be simplified before Deepavali, helped the council reach consensus without the need for voting.

For eight years, the GST regime has been marred by the multiplicity of tax slabs—5, 12, 18 and 28 per cent—that confused businesses, consumers,........

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