New Delhi: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will chair Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council meeting through video conferencing today (October 12) .

The meeting will take place at 4 pm.

The Minister is also scheduled to address a press conference on economic issues at 12.30 pm today.

On October 5, the GST Council at its 42nd meeting had decided to extend the levy of compensation cess beyond the transition period of five years for such period as may be required to meet the revenue gap.

The Centre, on the request of States, also decided to increase the shortfall amount to Rs 1.10 lakh crores from Rs 97,000 crores under the borrowing option.

Sitharaman said 21 States have chosen borrowing option 1 for compensation of revenue shortfall due to GST implementation.

She clarified that the Centre is not denying compensation to any State but those which have not chosen any borrowing option have to borrow from the market.