GST revenue collection for August close to 94,000 crore

The total number of GSTR 3B Returns filed for July, up to 31 August, stood at 67 lakh, which is slightly higher than the 66 lakh returns filed in June (up to 31 July). 

The last date of filing returns for July 2018 in Kerala was extended up to 5th October 2018 in the wake of the floods.

The total revenue earned by the central and state governments after settlement, including provisional settlement of Rs12,000 crore in August 2018 stood at Rs36,963 crore for CGST and Rs41,136 crore for the SGST. For June-July 2018, compensation of Rs14,930 crore has been released to the states.

The Rs93,960 crore GST revenues collected in August 2018 is slightly lower than the July collection of Rs96,483 crore, and the June collection of Rs95,610 crore. The chart shows trends in revenue during the current year.

One of the main factors for the dip in tax revenues is probable postponement of sale of items for which tax rate was reduced by the council as the decision to reduce the tax rate was taken in a meeting held on 21 July while the notification of the reduced rate came into effect only from 27 July 2018. Since it would have taken some time for the market to pass on the benefit of reduced taxes, consumers would have postponed their decision to buy expecting the benefit. The actual impact of reduction of rate of taxes would be observed only from next month onwards as the rate reduction would have got affected only in the last few days of the month.

Even past trend of indirect tax collection shows that while July collections are 8.2 per cent of the total annual collections, August collections are at a lower level of 7.7 per cent of the total annual collections. This is another reason for lower collections during the month of August as compared to that in July, as per a finance ministry release.