Subdued demand in the economy has resulted in revenue from the Goods and Services Tax dropping for the second consecutive month in September to a 19-month low of ₹91,916 crore. However analysts said the coming festive months should see an uptick in receipts.
Official data released on Thursday showed that the collections in September fell from ₹98,202 crore in August, which itself was lower than the ₹1,02,083 crore collected in July. The average monthly collections for financial year 2019-20 stand at ₹1,01,049 crore. The collections in September 2019 are lower than the ₹95,633 crore collected in August 2017, the very first complete month of GST collections.
“The total gross GST revenue collected in the month of September, 2019 is ₹91,916 crore, of which CGST is ₹16,630 crore, SGST ₹22,598 crore, IGST ₹45,069 crore and cess ₹7,620 crore,” the government said in a release.
“The total number of GSTR 3B returns filed for the month of August up to September 30, 2019 is 75.94 lakh.”
The revenue during September 2019 is 2.67% lower than what was collected in the same month of the previous year. “During April-September, 2019 vis-à-vis 2018, the domestic component has grown by 7.82% while the GST on imports has shown negative growth and the total collection has grown by 4.9%,” the release added.
“For the last couple of months, a drop in State GST collections has been sharper than for central GST (CGST), reasons for which need to be analysed in detail,” Pratik Jain, partner & leader, indirect tax, PwC India, said.
“Given the collections, further GST rate cuts till the end of the financial year now seem unlikely,” Mr. Jain said.
“The lower collections seem to be due to the lower GDP growth numbers that we have seen as GST is a transaction tax that is immediately impacted by any decline in any economic activity,” M.S. Mani, partner at Deloitte India, said.
