Goods and Services Tax (GST) collection in December topped ₹1.29-lakh crore, the lowest in three months.
However, the average monthly gross GST collection for the third quarter of 2021-22 was ₹1.30-lakh crore against ₹1.10-lakh crore and ₹1.15-lakh crore in the first tow quarters, respectively, a Finance Ministry statement said.
Higher revenues
The statement said the revenues for December are 13 per cent higher than in the same month last year and 26 per cent higher than in December 2019.
During the reporting month, revenues from import of goods was 36 per cent higher over the corresponding previous month and that from domestic transactions (including import of services) up 5 per cent.
December GST collection was close to ₹1.30-lakh crore despite the 17 per cent drop in the number of e-way bills generated in November at 6.1 crore compared 7.4 crore in October.
According to the Ministry statement, economic recovery and anti-evasion action — especially against fake billers — have been contributing to the robust GST collection.
The improvement has also been due to various rate rationalisation measures undertaken by the GST Council to correct the inverted duty structure. “It is expected that the positive trend in revenues will continue in the last quarter as well,” the statement said.
Disparity in reporting
MS Mani, Partner at Deloitte India, says the GST collections reflect the continuing improvement in various macro-economic parameters and appear to have established a consistent trend over the past few months.
However, it would be interesting to look at the State-wise collections as there seems to some disparity with some reporting significant increases and others lagging compared to the previous year.
“The GST collections are high despite a reduction in the e-way bill generation during the same period possibly due to higher collection from the services sector accompanied by a continuing focus on implementation of technology-based anti-evasion measures,” he said.