GST collection touches all-time high in April at Rs 1.67 lakh crore

The monthly collection of Goods and Service tax was an all-time high of over Rs 1.67 lakh crore in April on the back of recovery in business activity gaining pace.

This was the first time since its launch that the GST collection has crossed Rs 1.5 lakh crore.

The revenues for the month of April 2022 are 20% higher than the GST revenues in the same month last year. During the month, revenues from import of goods was 30% higher and the revenues from domestic transactions (including import of services) are 17% higher than the revenues from these sources during the same month last year.

The revenues for April were 20% higher than the GST revenues in the same month last year. During the month, revenues from import of goods was 30% higher and the revenues from domestic transactions (including import of services) are 17% higher than the revenues from these sources during the same month last year.

"For the first time gross GST collection has crossed Rs 1.5 lakh crore mark. Total number of e-way bills generated in the month of March 2022 was 7.7 crore, which is 13% higher than 6.8 crore e-way bills generated in the month of February 2022, which reflects recovery of business activity at faster pace," the finance ministry said.

"This shows clear improvement in the compliance behaviour, which has been a result of various measures taken by the tax administration to nudge taxpayers to file returns timely, to make compliance easier and smoother and strict enforcement action taken against errant taxpayers identified based on data analytics and artificial intelligence," the ministry said.

Economists said this augurs well for a robust year-on-year growth in collection.

"Even though the spike in the GST collections in April 2022 partly benefits from year end adjustments, the all time high magnitude of inflows is very enthusing, and augurs well for a robust year on year growth in the months ahead. This is lso evidence of a healthy pace of economic activity in March 2022 in spite of the escalating geo-political conflict, Aditi Nayar, Chief Economist at ICRA, said.

Deloitte India Partner MS Mani said while the GST collections in respect of March have always been high, the record collections of Rs 1.68 lakh crore reported are on account of multiple favourable factors, including the recent changes on permitting input tax credits only upon timely compliance by the vendors.

"The impact of the continuing focus on ensuring timely compliance by all GST registrants by restricting the input tax credits of the buyers together with enhanced analytics to detect evasion has also contributed significantly to the all-time high collections reported," Mani said.

Tax Connect Advisory Partner Vivek Jalan said while the high collection depicts that the Indian Economy is coming out of the pandemic in full swing now, it is also a result of the tremendous price rise in input cost and implementation of GSTR 2B wherein the recipient can take only that much credit for input, input services and capital goods for which the supplier has filed his returns.

With PTI inputs.

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