GST revenue collection for Aug touches Rs 1,12,020 crore

The Ministry of Finance stated that August saw goods and services tax (GST) revenue collection of over Rs 1 lakh crore. GST revenue for last month stood at Rs 1,12,020 crore, out of which central GST (CGST) is Rs 20,522 crore, state GST (SGST) is Rs 26,605 crore, integrated GST (IGST) is Rs 56,247 crore including Rs 26,884 crore collected on import of goods, and cess is Rs 8,646 crore.

The revenues for August is 30 per cent higher than the GST revenues in the same period last year. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic GST collections fell below Rs 1 lakh crore in June. GST collections had crossed Rs 1 lakh crore for nine months in a row before that.

The government has settled Rs 23,043 crore to CGST and Rs 19,139 crore to SGST from IGST as regular settlement, it stated. The Centre has also settled Rs 24,000 crore as IGST ad-hoc settlement between Centre and states/UTs. The total revenue of Centre and states after regular and ad-hoc settlements is Rs 55,565 crore for CGST and Rs 57,744 crore for the SGST.

Revenues from domestic services are 27 per cent higher than last year. In fact, if August 2019-20 revenues of Rs 98,202 crore are also taken into account then there’s a growth of 14 per cent in last month’s revenues.

This growth is driven by the easing of COVID-19 restrictions in July and August, when it crossed Rs 1 lakh crore again. The ministry stated that the GST collection indicates that the economy is recovering at a fast pace.

Experts too believe the same. Rajat Bose, Partner at Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co said, ”The GST collections for the month of August is very encouraging for the economy. What is heartening to see is that manufacturing states such as Maharashtra, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu has shown an increase of over 30 per cent as compared to last year which is a sure shot sign of economic recovery.”

”The GST collections are impressive as they are above Rs 1 lakh crore for several months in succession. Most of the key manufacturing states have shown an increase of 25-35 per cent in collections compared to the same period last year, indicating that the economic recovery may be faster in the current year,” said MS Mani, Senior Director, Deloitte India.

The ministry stated that along with economic growth, anti-evasion activities, especially action against fake billers have also been contributing to the enhanced GST collections. "The robust GST revenues are likely to continue in the coming months too,” it said.

State wise, Delhi saw an increase of 25 per cent in GST collections, while Maharashtra saw 31 per cent, Karnataka 35 per cent, Uttar Pradesh 17 per cent, West Bengal 20 per cent and Punjab 24 per cent and Kerala 31 per cent jump.

Also read: Q1 GST collections at 26.6% of budget estimates: Finance Ministry