A couple of weeks ago, the Indian government announced that mobile phones will fall under 18 percent GST slab, increasing the tax rate by 50 percent. Previously, the GST rate for mobile phones was set at 12 percent in India.
While several industry leaders complained about the change and requested the government to reconsider the decision, there has been no change yet. As the new tax rate takes effect from today, i.e. 1st April, smartphone manufactures have now increased pricing in India.
Xiaomi has announced that the pricing for Mi and Redmi branded smartphones in India has been increased following the 50 percent hike in GST. The company says that it has no choice other than hiking the prices of their products with the new GST rates in place effective today.
The company also cited the continuous depreciation of the Indian rupee against the US dollar as one of the reasons to hike pricing. Xiaomi has said that the newly updated pricing will soon appear for devices on Mi.com.
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Another smartphone brand that increased pricing is OPPO but the company has not yet officially announced this move. As per the report, it has started notifying dealers and partners across the country about its plan to increase pricing.
It seems that the company could not have picked up the worse day to announce this price hike given that today is April Fool’s day and many will consider this announcement from Xiaomi to be a joke. But, to be clear, this is not a joke and the prices for Xiaomi’s smartphones have gone up on Flipkart.
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