GST revenue collection for Oct second highest in history; crosses Rs 1.3 lakh cr

GST revenue collection for the month of October stood at Rs 1,30,127 crore, which is the second highest collection since implementation of the tax scheme. The October revenue is 24 per cent higher than that of October last year and 36 per cent higher than October 2019-20.

“The GST revenues for October have been the second highest ever since introduction of GST, second only to that in April 2021, which related to year-end revenues. This is very much in line with the trend in economic recovery. This is also evident from the trend in the e-way bills generated every month since the second wave,” stated the Ministry of Finance in a statement.

Out of the gross GST revenue collection, CGST comprises Rs 23,861 crore, SGST is Rs 30,42 crore, IGST is Rs 67,361 crore (including Rs 32,998 crore collected on import of goods) and cess is Rs 8,484 crore (including Rs 699 crore collected on import of goods).

The Ministry of Finance said that the government has settled Rs 27,310 crore to CGSR and Rs 22,394 crore to SGST from IGST as regular settlement. The total revenue for Centre and states after regular settlements is Rs 51,171 crore for CGST and Rs 52,815 crore for SGST.

Revenues from imports were 39 per cent higher and revenues from domestic transactions were 19 per cent higher than revenues from the same period last year.

The finance ministry stated that revenues would have been higher if sales of cars and other products had not been impacted by chip shortage. Increased compliance over the previous months aided in the high revenues, the ministry stated. Measures like nil filing through SMS, enabling Quarterly Return Monthly Payment (QRMP) system and auto-population of return are believed to have helped in the collection. Additionally, the GST Council has also taken steps to discourage non-compliant behaviour, like blocking of e-way bills for non-filing of returns, system-based suspension of registration of taxpayers who have failed to file six returns in a row and blocking of credit for return defaulters.

The Council also decided to waive off late fees allowing people to file old returns and be up-to-date with the filing.

“Overall, the impact of these efforts has ensured increased compliance and higher revenues. As a part of overall efforts to plug evasion, more steps to restrict fake ITC are under consideration of the GST Council,” the ministry stated.

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