DW BUREAU / Chandigarh Haryana's Deputy Chief Minister Dushyant Chautala on Friday asked the GST council to lower rates on textiles, fertilisers and footwear. During the 40th GST Council meeting, Chautala also sought to increase the deadline of filing tax for those paying GST less than Rs 5 crore. He raised several other issues pertaining to the goods and services tax faced by the state in the prevailing conditions arising out of the COVID-19 pandemic. After the meeting, Chautala said that Haryana has demanded from the union government to lower the tax on textiles, fertilisers and footwear. A similar demand came from Gujarat and Bihar, he said, as per a statement here. Further, the Haryana deputy CM said that he sought removal of penalty on those who failed to file the return in the last three years.         To increase the state and central revenues, he said this penalty must be eliminated. Besides the June deadline of filing tax for those paying GST less than Rs 5 crore must be extended to September 2020, Chautala said in the meeting. Chautala, whose party Jannayak Janta Party is a coalition partner of the BJP in Haryana, said the union government should give cess amount to states as financial assistance in this hour of crisis. He informed that in 2017, Rs 1.76 lakh crore was collected in this pool and while Rs 34,000 crore was distributed to states, an amount of Rs 54,600 crore of states is pending with the union government. In a relief to small taxpayers with turnover up to Rs 5 crore, the GST Council on Friday halved the interest on delayed filing of GST returns for February, March and April to 9 per cent, provided the returns are filed by September 2020. Also, the deadline for filing returns for May, June and July has been extended till September, without any interest or late fee, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said after a meeting of the council in New Delhi earlier in the day. (editor@dailyworld.in)