Committed to bring natural gas under GST regime, says PM Modi

Prime minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday said that India is committed to bring natural gas under the ambit of goods and services tax (GST), a move that is expected to reduce the cost of natural gas by reducing the burden of 'tax-on-tax'.

“We are trying to eliminate the cascading effect of different taxes on natural gas across different states. We are committed to bring natural gas under GST regime,” Modi said.

Since its implementation from 1 July, GST subsumed a dozen of taxes, introducing single levy, to simplify taxation system and remove the cascading effect of ‘tax on tax’. However, certain items such as petroleum products, real estate, were excluded from GST.

The statement came as the Prime Minister virtually dedicated to the nation and laid the foundation of key projects of the oil and gas sector in Tamil Nadu. Modi dedicated to the nation the Ramanathapuram-Thoothukudi natural gas pipeline and Gasoline Desulphurisation unit at Chennai Petroleum Corporation Limited, Manali. He also laid the foundation stone of Cauvery Basin Refinery at Nagapattinam.

Modi said that India is importing over 85% of oil and 53% of gas to meet the demand in 2019-20. "Can a diverse and talented nation like ours be so energy import dependent?" he said.

"Now, it is our collective duty to work towards clean and green sources of energy, reduce energy dependence. Our Government is sensitive to the concerns of the middle class."

He also said that while India is working to meet the growing energy demand, it is also reducing our energy import dependence and diversifying import sources.

In 2019-20, India was fourth in the world in refining capacity. About 65.2 million tonnes of petroleum products have been exported.

"These gas pipeline projects would also enable the development of City Gas projects which are being developed at 10 districts in Tamil Nadu at an investment of Rs.5,000 Crore. The gas from ONGC field will now be delivered to Southern Petrochemical Industries Corp Limited Tuticorin. This pipeline is going to supply of natural gas as feedstock at a cheaper cost to SPIC for manufacturing fertiliser. Feedstock will now be continuously available with no storage requirements. This is expected to result in saving in the range of ₹70 to ₹95 crores in cost of production annually.This will also bring down the final cost of production of fertilizer," an official statement said.

Over the last six years, over ₹50,000 crore worth oil and gas projects have been approvedfor implementation in Tamil Nadu. In the same period, over ₹9 100 crores worth projects sanctioned before 2014 were completed. In addition, over ₹4,300 crore worth projects are in the pipeline, it statement said.