Kolkata, Sep 19 (IANS): The government would not allow increase of incidence of indirect taxes on manufacturing products under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime, Union Minister of State for Finance and Corporate Affairs Arjun Ram Meghwal said on Sunday.

He also said that with the standard rate of GST, there would also be slab-based rates for different manufacturing products for a transition period before moving gradually towards the single tax rate regime.

"Under the GST regime, the indirect tax rate on services will rise but for manufacturing sector, we will not allow indirect tax rate to go up from the present level because we want progress of programmes like Make in India, Digital India, Stand Up India. We will try keeping the rates at par," said Meghwal on the sidelines of an event organised by MCC Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

He assured manufacturers that the indirect taxes would not be going up after the implementation of GST.

"There will be standard rate of GST and we are planning to bring slab-based rates. There will be exemptions also," he said.

Meghwal said that slab-based rates are necessary to protect manufacturing sectors belonging to low tax brackets. "Some sectors like Bikaner papad where tax is just one per cent.. how will these industries survive if a single standard rate (of about 18 percent or 17 percent) is applied," he said.

Slab-based rates and the standard rate will be decided by the GST Council, he said.

Meghwal said at present, liquor and petroleum products are not under the GST ambit, but the government will review this position after a year.

Product-based and location-based exemptions will be examined by the GST council, he added.