GST revenue collection grows; exceeds Rs 1 trillion mark in April

The Centre on Tuesday stated that the revenue collected towards Goods and Services Tax (GST) for the month of April 2018, surpassed the Rs trillion mark.

According to the Ministry of Finance, the total gross GST revenue collected in the month of April stood at Rs 1.03 trillion, consisting of Central GST (CGST) worth Rs 186 billion, State GST (SGST) of Rs 257 billion, Integrated GST (IGST) of Rs 505 billion (including 212 billion collected on imports) and cess of Rs 85.54 billion (including Rs 7.02 billion collected on imports).

Furthermore, the ministry noted that a total of 6.047 million GSTR 3B returns were filed for the month of March, as on April 30, as against 8.712 million, who are eligible to file returns for March, thus accounting for 69.5 per cent of the eligible proportion.

Meanwhile, out of 1.931 million composition dealers, the ministry said 1.147 million filed their quarterly return (GSTR 4) (59.40 per cent) and paid a total tax of Rs 5.79 billion, which is included in the aforementioned figure of total GST collected.

"The buoyancy in the tax revenue of GST reflects the upswing in the economy and better compliance. However, it is usually noticed that in the last month of the financial year, people also try to pay arrears of some of the previous months. Therefore, this month's revenue cannot be taken as a trend for the future" the ministry clarified.

The department further noted that the Central and State Governments earned a total revenue of Rs 324.93 billion for CGST and Rs 402.57 billion for the SGST respectively, after settlement in the month of April.

Last week, the Finance Ministry said Rs.7.19 trillion was mobilised from the GST during the period of August 2017 to March 2018. This includes Rs 1.19 trillion of CGST, Rs 1.72 trillion of SGST, Rs 3.66 trillion of IGST, including Rs 1.73 trillion on exports, and Rs 620.21 billion of cess, including Rs 57.02 billion on imports.