Fiscal tax collection to fall short of target: Official

The government on Monday said that with a subdued direct tax outlook, it expects revenue collection in the current fiscal to fall short by around Rs.50,000 crore, which would partly be made up by buoyant indirect taxes.

"There is likely to be some shortfall in direct taxes when we end up the year, but some part of it will be made good by indirect taxes because of the additional resource mobilization measures," Revenue Secretary Hasmukh Adhia told reporters here.

"Only the shortfall may be not more than 7 percent, may be around 5 percent shortfall may be there," he said.

Adhia said the total tax revenues in the current fiscal are likely to be around Rs.14 lakh crore, as against the budget estimate of Rs.14.5 lakh crore.

Noting that the revenue collection target for the current fiscal was a 16.5 percent growth over last year's actual collection growth of 9.9 percent, he said: "In a way the target looks to be ambitious, but the revenue position so far has been very very satisfactory."

While direct tax collection during April-September registered an increase of 12 percent, indirect taxes growth during April-August worked out to 12.2 percent after excluding the government's additional revenue measures during the year, he said.

Growth in indirect taxes reflected increasing demand and economic activity, he added.

"Goods are being sold, goods are being consumed, they are being imported, people are paying excise on it, the service tax is also showing some kind of buoyancy. So all this is looking good," Adhia said.