Who amongst the following tookover as the Chairman of the Empowered Committee of state Finance Ministers on ‘GST’ in March, 2015?

The correct answer is C) K.M. Mani, the Kerala Finance Minister, who took over as Chairman of the Empowered Committee of State Finance Ministers on GST in March 2015. The Empowered Committee was the body that worked out the design of GST with the Centre before the constitutional framework was finalised.

• A) M. Ravi is not the person who held this chair. He is not the correct answer.
• B) K. Chandrashekhar Rao was a state Chief Minister, not the finance minister who chaired the committee. This is a name-confusion trap.
• D) Ram Gopal Yadav is a political figure from outside this role and is not the answer.

The link to the syllabus is Indian federalism. The GST design required consensus between the Union and the states, and the Empowered Committee was the mechanism for that. The later constitutional body, the GST Council under Article 279A (101st Amendment, 2016), replaced this arrangement. So if the question is framed in the past tense for 2015, you should answer according to the arrangement of that time, not the present one.

Trap: Aspirants confuse state Chief Ministers with state Finance Ministers and pick the more prominent name. The question asks for the finance minister who chaired the committee.