Monthly GST collections breached the Rs 1-lakh-crore mark for the second time since its launch in July 2017 for September (collected in October), giving the Centre some hope that the wide revenue gap against its budget target could be narrowed in the second half of the fiscal. While the latest figure is about 4% higher than the average of the first seven months of the fiscal and analysts said it may have reflected the tax’s stabilisation and increased compliance due to anti-evasion steps like e-way bill, the fact that September was the deadline for final settlement of last year’s tax liabilities might have also boosted collections. It remains to be seen if the latest spurt heralded a sustainable trend.

GST revenue had last crossed the Rs 1-lakh-crore threshold for March 2018 (collected in April), again a settlement month.

The government said: “The total gross GST revenue collected in October 2018 is Rs 1,00,710 crore of which central GST is Rs 16,464 crore, state GST is Rs 22,826 crore, IGST is Rs 53,419 crore (including Rs 26,908 crore collected on imports) and cess is Rs 8,000 crore (including Rs 955 crore collected on imports). The total number of GSTR 3B returns filed for September up to October 31, 2018, is 67.45 lakh.”