Second highest-ever GST collection at ₹ 1.55 lakh crore in January

The GST collection in January surged to over ₹ 1.55 lakh crore, the second highest-ever mop-up, the finance ministry said on Tuesday.

"The gross GST revenue collected in the month of January 2023 till 5:00 PM on 31.01.2023 is ₹ 1,55,922 crore of which CGST is ₹ 28,963 crore, SGST is ₹ 36,730 crore, IGST is ₹ 79,599 crore (including ₹ 37,118 crore collected on import of goods) and cess is ₹ 10,630 crore (including ₹  768 crore collected on import of goods)," the ministry said in a statement.

The revenues in the current financial year up to January 2023 are 24 per cent higher than the GST revenues during the same period last year.

This is for the third time, in the current financial year, GST collection has crossed ₹ 1.50 lakh crore mark. The GST collection in January 2023 is the second highest next only to the ₹ 1.68 lakh crore gross mop-up reported in April 2022.

"Over the last year, various efforts have been made to increase the tax base and improve compliance. The percentage of filing of GST returns (GSTR-3B) and of the statement of invoices (GSTR-1), till the end of the month, has improved significantly over years," the ministry said.

In the October-December 2022 quarter, a total of 2.42 crore GST returns were filed till the end of the next month compared to 2.19 crore in the same quarter of the last year. This is due to various policy changes introduced during the year to improve compliance, it added.