Senior officials of Apparel Export Promotion Council met the finance minister Piyush Goyal and textiles minister Smiriti Irani to discuss various issues facing the industry especially the huge blockages in GST refunds since the roll out of GST and slow disbursements in RoSl.

The industry has witnessed a reduction in drawback and RoSl benefits by over 5 per cent of FoB since the pre GST period. This, coupled with the disadvantage of around 10 per cent faced by the industry vis-a-vis its competitors in the major markets like EU, due to lack of preferential access, had led to India losing out to Bangladesh and Vietnam in a big way.

HKL Magu, Chairman, Apparel Export Promotion Council expressed his gratitude for the speedy response from both ministers. He said, the FM has instructed his team to urgently identify central and state embedded taxes and work out a reimbursement mechanism. Also, the Ministry will expedite GST and ROSL refunds in a time bound manner. FM assured all possible support from his Ministry to enable exports growth and creation of jobs by the employment intensive apparel, made ups and textile industry. He said, “The industry has also assured that with our competitive position restored, we would be able to regain lost market share, further consolidate these gains and create gainful employment in shortest possible time.”