One of the most favoured duty reimbursement schemes among exporters - the Duty Entitlement Passbook (DEPB) scheme - is likely to be scrapped, as the government gears up to introduce the Goods and Services Tax (GST) from April 1.
The 14-year old scheme is the most popular among exporters, especially in the engineering including automobiles sector. India's exports went up by 37.55 per cent year-on-year to $ 245.86 billion during 2010-11.
As a setback to exporters, shipments of 1,100 items will be entitled to lower tax refunds from October 1 when curtains draw on the popular DEPB scheme, government announced on Friday.
After getting periodic extensions, the 14-year-old tax-refund scheme is finally coming to an end in June.
The finance ministry has turned down a proposal for shifting the exporters' tax refund plan to the commerce ministry, which has been lobbying hard to take charge of the duty entitlement pass book scheme.