The Centre on Friday decided to provide special financial assistance to the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) to offset the Goods and Services Tax (GST) on langar. The help would be provided under the Sewa Bhoj Yojana. The SGPC and Lucknow Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (LGPC) have long been demanding waiver on langar items.
The GST is not levied on food served in the langar, but is charged on the purchase of raw materials used to prepare the food.The Golden Temple has paid over Rs 2 crore in GST on langar items till date. The purchase for the Golden Temple’s kitchen, which feeds between 55,000 and 60,000 devotees daily, comes to around Rs 75 crore annually. On Tuesday, SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal who, along with his wife and Union Minister Harsimrat Badal, paid obeisance at the shrine, had said that the GST on langar purchases at the Golden Temple would be waived.
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