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In the first year of the Goods and Services Tax (GST), the government collected Rs 7.41 lakh crore in taxes with revenues for a good part of four months not being accounted for.
The revenue for four months was not included because of the mid-year rollout and an accounting lag. GST, the new tax regime, was rolled out in India on July 1, 2017.
According to a finance ministry statement, the GST collection has been put at Rs 7.41 lakh crore for the period ending March 31, 2018.
The new tax regime has subsumed 17 central and state taxes on sale of goods and rendering of services.
Under the new system, the revenues accrued at the completion of a month would be taken on record. The collection for the month of April is likely to be released on May 1.
“During 2017-18, total revenue collected under GST in the period between August 2017 and March 2018 has been Rs 7.19 lakh crore."
“This includes Rs 1.19 lakh crore of CGST, Rs 1.72 lakh crore of SGST, Rs 3.66 lakh crore of IGST (including Rs 1.73 lakh crore on imports) and Rs 62,021 crore of cess (including Rs 5702 crore on imports),” the finance ministry statement said.
Under GST, the tax levied on consumption of goods or rendering of service is split 50:50 between the Centre and the states. Such tax is known as Central-GST or CGST and State-GST or SGST.
On inter-state movement of goods as well as imports, an Integrated-GST or IGST is levied, which accrues to the Centre. A cess is levied on top of these taxes on sin and luxury goods which make up for the compensation kitty used to make good of any revenue shortfall faced by states on implementation of GST.
The mere Rs 24,000 crore addition shown for March as against an average monthly collection of Rs 89,000 crore in the previous eight months indicated government desire to move to more current accounting methodology.
As on today, GST collections are accounted for only when returns after filed by the third week of the following month.
The government has shifted to a cash basis of accounting from 2018-19 fiscal year beginning April.
