The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Saturday alleged that the Congress Party is opposing the passage of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Bill to create obstacles to the nation's development and progress.
"The Congress had started the GST. Now, everyone believes that the GST is very important for employment, youth, labourers, farmers and economic growth. Although a national consensus on GST has been formed, the Congress is still opposing it to create obstacles to progress. They want to gain appreciation by stalling the good works of the NDA Government. They won't be successful in this Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, Rajiv Pratap Rudy told media here.
"We discuss any issue with the opposition which is for the benefit of the nation. By discussing the issue with the opposition, I believe Prime Minister Narendra Modi proved that we want to take everybody along," he added.
Earlier, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley flayed the opposition, mainly the Congress Party, for delaying the government's ambitious GST Bill in Parliament, saying that the passage of the Bill is being delayed for collateral reasons.
"As far as the GST is concerned, I have no doubt in my mind that the attempt is to delay is entirely for collateral reasons. The only collateral reason I suspect is if I couldn't do it, why should somebody else do it," said Jaitley.
The NDA Government is making all out efforts to bring about a consensus on the GST Bill, which is now caught in a political logjam in Parliament, but there are no chances of it getting passed during the Winter Session, dealing a blow to the economic reforms process of the government.
The Congress has been stalling passage of the GST Bill over its demand for a simple GST regime where states do not have powers to levy additional tax over an 18 percent tax rate that forms a part of the Constitutional Amendment Bill.