Tobacco Farmers Demand GST Rollback

New Delhi: The Federation of All India Farmer Associations (FAIFA) has asked the government to roll back the 5 per cent Goods and Services Tax (GST) on raw tobacco in the upcoming GST Council meeting on 18 June and to treat tobacco crop on par with other agricultural crops.

Apprehending a steep fall in prices of tobacco leaves and raw tobacco post the implementation of GST, tobacco farmers across Andhra Pradesh, who are members of FAIFA, have stalled auctions in all platforms.

“Farmers from different auction platforms in the southern black soil (SBS) region decided not to bring our produce to the market to protest 5% GST on tobacco leaves and 28% on unmanufactured tobacco,” said FAIFA vice-president Gadde Seshagiri Rao.

FAIFA said, raw tobacco and unmanufactured tobacco were exempted from the central excise since the time of Charan Singh government.

Another trade body, Guntur based the Indian Tobacco Association has decided to send a delegation to meet Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, urging him to roll back GST.