Teething troubles normal: M Venkaiah Naidu

Chennai: Asserting that any new initiative such as the Goods and Services Tax (GST) is bound to face problems, besides triggering debate, Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu said the focus now should be on implementing the new tax reform and making it more people-friendly.

Describing the GST as a path breaking measure of the government, he pointed out, “any new legislation (or) any transformation, there will have some problem and there are problems. How can anybody deny, the debate is on... let it go on.”
 After agreeing on GST, one should only think of implementing it and also on make it more effective and more people friendly, Venkaiah Naidu  said and added that is the idea.

Referring to the ongoing debate on the GST, he said it should however be ‘meaningful and purposeful.’ Speaking at the 90th anniversary celebrations of the Andhra Chamber of Commerce here on Tuesday he said the implementation of GST was a collective decision of all political parties. During his tenure as Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister he had mobilised support for the new tax law.

Turning to the demonetisation drive, Mr. Venkaiah said, “We have to wage a war against corruption and we have to end black money. This is one idea. If others have other good ideas, let them give the ideas to the government and tell people that they (government) have gone wrong and we will come to power and we will do this”.

Corruption, he said, was eating into the vitals of the system at various levels. He was not referring to any particular party's regime ‘as it was not my responsibility now’. Demonetisation was one step to end it. Initiatives like ‘Save the girl child’ of the government should be regarded as national programmes and people's programmes and not those of any particular party.