In what can be termed a reflection of the recovery of business activity faster, Gross GST collection has crossed the Rs 1.5 lakh crore mark for the first time since it was introduced in 2017. The total number of e-way bills generated in March 2022 was 7.7 crore, 13% higher than the 6.8 crore e-way bills generated in February 2022.
GST stands for Goods and Services Tax, levied on India’s supply of goods and services. GST subsumed several indirect taxes imposed by the Centre and State Governments, including Central Excise duty, ServiceTax, VAT, Purchase Tax, Central Sales Tax, Entry Tax,Local Body Taxes, Octroi, Luxury Tax, etc. The gross GST revenue collected in April, 2022 is Rs 1,67,540 crore of which CGST is Rs 33,159 crore, SGST is Rs 41,793 crore, IGST is Rs 81,939 crore (including Rs 36,705 crore collected on import of goods) and cess is Rs 10,649 crore (including Rs 857 crore collected on import of goods).
The gross GST collection in April 2022 is all-time high, Rs 25,000 crore more than the next highest collection of Rs. 1,42,095 crore, in March 2022. The government has settled Rs 33,423 crore to CGST and Rs 26962 crore to SGST from IGST. The total revenue of the Centre and the States in April 2022 after the regular settlement is Rs 66,582 for CGST and Rs 68,755 for the SGST.
The revenues for April 2022 are 20% higher than the GST revenues in the same month last year. During the month, revenues from import of goods were 30% higher. The revenues from domestic transactions (including import of services) are 17% higher than those from these sources during the same month last year. April 2022 saw the highest ever tax collection on a single day on 20th April 2022 and the highest collection during an hour, from 4 PM to 5PM.
On 20th April 2022, Rs 57,847crore was paid through 9.58 lakh transactions and during 4-5 PM, almost Rs 8,000 crore was paid through 88,000 transactions.
The highest single-day payment last year (on the same date) was Rs 48,000 crore through 7.22 lakh transactions and the highest one-hour collection (2-3PM on the same date last year) was Rs 6,400 crore through 65,000 transactions.
During April 2022, 1.06 crore GST returns in GSTR-3B were filed, of which 97 lakh pertained to March 2022, compared to 92 lakh returns filed in April 2021. Similarly, in April 2022, 1.05 crore statements of invoices issued in GSTR-1 were filed. Until the end of the month, the filing percentage for GSTR-3B in April 2022 was 84.7% compared to 78.3% in April 2021, and the filing percentage for GSTR-1 in April 2022 was 83.11% to 73.9% in April 2021.
This shows clear improvement in compliance behaviour, which has resulted from various measures taken by the tax administration to nudge taxpayers to file returns timely, make compliance easier and smoother and strict enforcement action taken against errant taxpayers identified based on data analytics and artificial intelligence.
The chart below shows trends in monthly gross GST revenues during the current year. The table shows the state-wise figures of GST collected in each State during April 2022 compared to April 2021.