'Govt may have tax collection of Rs 32 lakh crore in current fiscal'

New Delhi [India], January 2 : Seeing the whopping collection of goods and services tax (GST) in the past 10 months, experts are confident that government may close this financial year with a tax collection of Rs 31-32 lakh crore, which in turn will have a healthy impact on government revenues and also on fiscal deficit in the country.
The collections from GST rose 15 per cent year-on-year to over Rs 1.49 lakh crore in December, indicating improved manufacturing output and consumption demand besides better compliance.
Manorajan Sharma, Chief Economist, Informerics Ratings, said that the revenue is expected to be more than the estimates of the government.
"Consistently for the past several months we have been achieving this GST collection monthly figure on a monthly average of Rs 1.40-1.50 lakh crore. That means for the period from April 2022 to March 2023, we may have a GST collection for the government of India of something around Rs 18 lakh crore." The government had budgeted tax revenues at something like Rs 27.5 lakh crore for the full financial year, he said.
"Given the kind of robust tax collections both for direct and indirect taxes in the country, we are confident that we may close this financial year with a tax collection of Rs 31-32 lakh crore which will have a healthy impact on government revenues and also on fiscal deficit in the country," he added
Sharma said that there were several factors which pushed GST collection to this level.
"There are factors such as the stabilisation of the GST mechanism, a lot of other people have been brought into the tax nets, there were several leakages, several gaps which are now plugged, but obviously, the rising inflation also has played some part in pushing up the GST collections in the country," Sharma said.
MS Mani, Partner, Deloitte India, said an 18 per cent increase in the GST revenues from domestic transactions, viewed with the increase in e-way bill issuance and the significant increase in GST collections by key manufacturers and consuming states, would be indicative of a sustained manufacturing and consumption cycle across recent months.
The steady increase in GST collections across recent months, while being reflective of the manufacturing and consumption stability across states, would also tie up with key macroeconomic indicators, which have been pointing to a good economic performance across key sectors, he said.