Various fish workers’ organisations have written to the Union Finance Minister urging him to completely roll back GST in the fisheries sector as it would have far reaching implications on the fisherfolk in the state. The organisations also wrote to the state Finance minister Amit Mitra seeking his intervention in this regard. National Fisher Workers’ Forum (NFF) has requested the Union minister to consider their appeals. In its letter, the forum has mentioned that the implementation of GST on fisheries sector would be disastrous and said that the fisheries sector plays a vital role in Indian economy through substantial forex earnings, employment generation, supporting livelihoods of millions of fishermen and ensuring nutritional and food security. Debasish Shyamal, Secretary of NFF said: “We condemn Centre’s decision for creating burden on the small scale fisherfolk in the name of introduction of GST. Since it is a zero investment industry, the Centre should keep fisheries out of the GST ambit.” The Dakshinbanga Matsyajibi Forum (DMF), another organisation, has written to state Finance minister Amit Mitra in this regard. Milan Das, general secretary of the DMF said that the contribution of fisheries to total Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is about 1.3 percent. This sector is currently undergoing serious crisis because of dwindling returns and higher investment and operating costs. The introduction of GST on many of tax exempted items under VAT regime and exorbitant increase in new GST rates on existing taxable items will have far-reaching negative consequences in the livelihoods of the fishing community and to the fisheries economy. This has happened when the other primary and traditional job sectors were given significant concessions to improve the livelihoods of communities working in these sectors, Das said. Fish, fish products and fishing inputs were exempted from commercial taxes by almost all coastal state governments earlier. Over the years, the modernisation of fishing paved the way for introduction of new fishing technologies and taxes were also introduced on boats and engines. The other items were always outside the regime of commercial taxes. After the introduction of the GST, most of the existing non-taxable items became taxable. The tax rate of existing taxable items increased exorbitantly and some of the items were included in the highest category of 28% tax. The highest category of GST were meant for luxury items but unfortunately the Marine Engines used by fishermen were also included in the same category. It means that GST for a BMW Car and Marine Engines for fishing are in the same category of 28% now.