FM Jaitley dismisses speculations on July GST collection, says 'red line has been crossed'

Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Tuesday rubbished the media speculations on the figures of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) collected for the month of July, and added that the targeted 'red line has been crossed'.

The minister highlighted that out of the 59.57lakh people eligible to file for GST in the month of July, excludes those who opted for composition scheme and the August registrations.

"38.38lakh filed their returns as of 10 a.m. this morning, thus achieving compliance rate of 64.42 percent," Jaitley told the media here.

Further, the Finance Minister revealed that GST of Rs. 92,283 crore has been received, including a compensation cess of Rs. 7198 crore, for the month of July.

"The last date for payment of GST for July 2017 was August 25, while the last day for claiming transactional credit was August 28. Since this is the first month, we did expect some spill over to take place. However, 64.42 percent have complied as of 10 a.m. this morning," he stated.

"If you calculate based on the budget, a combined target of Rs.91, 000 crore was set, which we have exceeded, keeping compensation cess aside," he said.

Adding to this he said that figures need to be broken up as there is a need to be seen whether any state has not had a 14 percent increase.

"If so, it is to be compensated out of the compensation cess. So far, we can say that the red line has been crossed," Jaitley added.

The GST collection of Rs. 92,283 crore, Jaitley said, included a Central GST (CGST) revenue of Rs.14, 894 crore, State GST (SGST) revenue of Rs. 22,722 crore, Integrated GST (IGST) revenue of Rs. 47,469 crore, including that Rs. 20,964 crore revenue from imports. The IGST will be allocated between the Centre and states, he further stated.

"Centre fixes the indirect tax revenue at the beginning of every year. For three months, we had central excise and service tax. The balance can come from GST. On the other hand, target for states can be calculated by adding 14 percent each for two years to the tax collected for the base year (2015-16)," said Jaitley.

Meanwhile, with regards to the number of registration received, he claimed that out of 72.33 lakh taxpayers who have migrated to the GST, 58.53 lakh have registered completely, while 13.80 lakh taxpayers have registered but not completed all the formalities.

Additionally, 18.83 lakh registrations have been approved, as of 10 a.m. this morning.

"A late filing penalty is to be levied to the extent of Rs.100 per day for CGST and SGST," added Jaitley.

With the given figures, Jaitley said the new tax regime has helped bring more non-taxpayers into the taxation net, as a more efficient tax system checks evasion better. However, he stated that it was too early to assess fiscal deficit.