Even as the states and Centre agreed on key provisions on Goods and Services Tax (GST) today, there is something that is almost going unnoticed by several industry trackers — preparing tax officials for the new taxation law.

The sales tax officers across India are being trained in different locations and are being prepared for the upcoming centralised tax law.

The Centre has taken on a challenging task: to train nearly two million officers to handle the new tax mechanism. The Centre has roped in senior tax experts from the industry and from the government mechanism to train about 18 lakh tax officers across the country in four phases in line with their ranks, and training sessions are being carried out in various cities since September, say industry trackers.

On Saturday, the consensus between states and the Centre would mean that the July 1 deadline looks achievable.

"Approval of CGST & IGST laws by GST Council is indeed a very good news, it brings us closer to July 1 implementation. SGST and UTGST laws to be approved on March 16 council meeting, so we can expect bills in the parliament and state assemblies post that for passage in March. The 40 per cent cap does find mention in laws approved, if this is just ceiling rate and is to subsume cesses going forward and not for any increase in peak GST rate of 28 per cent other than cess its fine. The action of the Council post March 16 meeting will shift to rate fitment of goods and services in 4 brackets which is critical," said Harishanker Subramaniam, national leader- indirect tax, EY India.

"Approval of CGST and IGST laws by the GST council is a decisive step towards implementation of GST from July 1 this year. While some legal drafting etc is still left, government looks all set to get these passed in the second half of the Budget session later this month. It seems that Council has agreed to all the legislative suggestions of the States including those relating to cross empowerment under IGST laws. With this, I don't see any roadblock in GST becoming a reality from July 1," said Pratik Jain, Indirect Tax Leader, PwC India.