The Maharashtra Legislative Assembly on Monday unanimously ratified the Goods and Services Tax Constitution Amendment Bill, ANI reported. This makes it the eighth state in the country to give the long-pending Bill its formal consent. The Centre needs at least 15 states to approve the Bill for it to move to the next step in the process, which is implementation of the single national tax regime across the nation.

The Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled Goa has a special Assembly session scheduled for August 31 to discuss the proposed law and ratify the GST Bill. The West Bengal Assembly had unlisted it from its special session on Monday and postponed discussions indefinitely. The Bill was cleared by both houses of Parliament on August 3.

The GST Bill seeks to bring in a single tax rate to replace India's complicated current rules, which include Central excise duty, service tax, additional customs duties, value added tax, entertainment tax and so on. It will replace 17 indirect tax levies. So far, it was ratified by Jharkhand, Gujarat, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Assam, Himachal Pradesh and Chhattisgarh.