GST collection at Rs 86,449 crores, declines for the second straight month

The gross GST collection in August stood at Rs 86,449 crore, down from Rs 87,422 crore collected in July, the Finance Ministry said.

New Delhi: A total of Rs 86,449 crore GST revenue was collected in the month of August, which is a decline of Rs 11,753 crores or 12% over the GST collected during the same month last year, showed the latest data released by the ministry of finance on Tuesday evening.

This is the second straight month when the GST collection has declined after the Centre started the unlock process in June this year.

“The gross GST revenue collected in the month of August, 2020 is Rs 86,449 crore of which CGST is Rs 15,906 crore, SGST is Rs 21,064 crore, IGST is Rs 42,264 crore,” said the ministry of finance.

Trend in GST Collection

Finance ministry said the IGST includes Rs 19,179 crore collected on import of goods while the GST Cess accounts to Rs 7,215 crore, including Rs 673 crore Cess collected on import of goods.

Ups and downs in GST collection

GST collection was at Rs 32,172 crores in April this year when the entire country was under complete nationwide lockdown, however, it improved to Rs 62,152 crores in May and touched the figure of Rs 90,917 crores in June this year.

This year's June GST collection was Rs 9,022 crores less or 91% of the GST collection during the same month last year.

A sharp improvement in GST collection in the month of June this year, when the Centre started gradual opening of businesses and industries under its unlock process, gave rise to hopes that the economy was slowly returning to the pre-Covid levels.

However, since then the GST collection has declined for the two months in a row, in July and August.

GST Collection, which was Rs 90,917 crores in June declined by Rs 3,495 crores or 3.84% to come down 87,422 crores in July. And in August the GST collection registered a further decline of Rs 973 crores, a marginal decline of 1.11% to come down to Rs 86,449 crores.

The Union government has settled Rs 18,216 crore to CGST and Rs 14,650 crore to SGST from IGST as regular settlement.

The total revenue earned by Central Government and the State Governments after regular settlement in the month of August, 2020 is Rs 34,122 crore for CGST and Rs 35,714 crore for the SGST.

“The revenues for the month are 88% of the GST revenues in the same month last year,” the finance ministry said.

In a statement, the finance ministry said during the month, the revenues from import of goods were 77% and the revenues from domestic transactions (including import of services) were 92% of the revenues from these sources during the same month last year.

“The taxpayers with turnover less than Rs 5 crore continue to enjoy relaxation in filing of returns till September,” said the ministry.

(Article by Krishnanand Tripathi)