GST collections rose 12 per cent to over Rs 1.61 lakh crore in June because of higher demand for goods and the good performance of the services sector and the authorities’ focus on compliance.

The finance ministry said indirect tax collections were 12 per cent higher than last June and around 3 per cent higher than in May. The gross GST collection has crossed the Rs 1.60 lakh crore mark for the fourth time since the roll-out of the indirect tax regime six years ago on July 1, 2017.

The average monthly gross GST collection for the first (April-June) quarter of the 2021-22, 2022-23 and 2023-24 are Rs 1.10 lakh crore, Rs 1.51 lakh crore and Rs 1.69 lakh crore, respectively, the finance ministry said in a statement.

“The gross GST revenue collected in the month of June 2023 is Rs 1,61,497 crore, of which central GST is Rs 31,013 crore, state GST is Rs 38,292 crore, integrated GST is Rs 80,292 crore (including Rs 39,035 crore collected on import of goods) and cess is Rs 11,900 crore (including Rs 1,028 crore collected on import of goods),” the statement said.

GST officers have busted 304 syndicates involving 9,000 fake GSTINs and input tax credit (ITC) claims of Rs 25,000 crore in the ongoing drive against bogus firms, CBIC chairman Vivek Johri said.

The chief of the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) flagged that only 40 per cent of the corporate income taxpayer base is registered under the Goods and Services Tax (GST). Currently, 1.39 lakh businesses are registered under GST, launched six years ago on July 1, 2017.

M.S. Mani, partner, Deloitte India, said the collections “indicate that the extensive focus of the authorities on the compliance and ongoing audits have streamlined the approach of all businesses towards GST .

“The fact that state-wise collection growth is in the band of 10-20 per cent for many of the large states would also indicate that uniformity of the growth and centralised approach to building tax compliant behaviour.”

Abhishek Jain, partner and national head — indirect taxes, KPMG India, said “consistent breach of the Rs 1.5 lakh crore mark is a big cheer for the government and economy; specifically on the date of completion of six years of this historic tax reform. With the continued focus on anti-evasion measures, increasing trend on collections is expected to continue”.

Gautam Mahanti, business head, IRIS Business Services, said “the domestic transactions have grown by a healthy 18 per cent y-o-y, which is also corroborated by the e-way bill transactions for the same period (8.81 crore in May 23 vs 7.36 crore in May 22) to compensate for the falling collections in import of goods.

“The buoyancy in the state of the economy is expected to continue giving a fillip to the increasing collections in the coming months.”