Kolkata: Finance Ministers of all the States will meet in Delhi on June 18 to discuss the issue of implementation of VAT (Value Added tax) at the State level and to ascertain the views of the States to the law amendment proposals enabling them to impose service tax, West Bengal Finance Minister Asim Dasgupta said today (June 12, 2004).

''The Finance Ministers of all the State Governments, eight of whom are also Chief Ministers, have been invited to Delhi on June 18. Two issues will be discussed VAT implementation at the state level and the proposal for amendments in the law to enable the states to impose service tax,'' Dasgupta, also Convener of the Empowered Committee of State Finance Ministers on Tax Reforms, said.

He said that Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram had given his consent to be present at the meeting.

Pointing out that the Centre had collected Rs 8,000 crore last year from service tax all over the country, Dasgupta said that as per the present constitutional provisions, the states were neither entitled to any share of this, nor were they empowered to impose service tax on their own.

Dasgupta, who met Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram in Delhi on June nine to discuss matters related to finances of the State Government, said he had demanded that the state be allowed to take low-interest loans for high-cost debt servicing.

''Presently, the state gets Central loans at interest ranging from 10.5 to 11 per cent. On the other hand, loans can be obtained from the market at five per cent interest,'' Dasgupta said.