Goods and Services Tax (GST) collections fell to a three-month low of 1.59 billion rupees in August, data from New Delhi’s finance ministry showed on Friday. However, the figure was 11 percent higher than in August last year. Experts expect collections to increase for the rest of the year.
“Receipts for August 2023 were 11% higher than GST revenues for the same month last year. This month, revenues from imports of goods were up 3% from the same month last year, and revenues from domestic transactions (including imports of services) were up 14%.” .
The August GST collection is linked to July’s goods and services related invoices. The statement further said that of the total GST, CGST (Central Goods and Services Tax) contributed more than Rs 2,800 crore while SGST (National Goods and Services Tax) and IGST (9 Integrated GST) took share More than Rs 35,000 crore and Rs 83,000 crore. The tax revenue provided is approximately Rs. 117 billion.
Commenting on the latest data collection, Deloitte India Partner MS Mani said: “All major manufacturing and consuming states saw increases ranging from 10% to 23%, suggesting that the overall increase in domestic consumption was fairly widespread across the states”.
Vivek Jalan, a partner at Tax Connect Advisory, believes that the central government’s “Make in India” initiative has also started to bear fruit, with domestic GST collections rising by 14%, while import collections rose by only 3%. However, more needs to be done to further boost domestic consumption. As an example, he said, “the tariffs on certain manufactured goods, such as lithium-ion batteries, are much lower than the tariffs on raw materials.”
