India's direct tax collection exceeds Budget Estimates, grows over 17% to Rs 16.61 lakh crore

Direct tax collections in FY23 saw a jump of 17.63 per cent to Rs 16.61 lakh crore compared with the corresponding period a year ago, revealed official data released by the Ministry of Finance on Monday. This is the highest ever direct tax collection in this financial year, confirmed sources from the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT).

The provisional figures of Direct Tax collections in the previous financial year stood at Rs 14.12 lakh crore. The Budget Estimate (BE) for direct tax revenue in the Union Budget for FY23 was at Rs.14.20 lakh crore, and the Revised Estimate (RE) at Rs 16.50 lakh crore. The provisional direct tax collections (net of refunds) have exceeded the BE by 16.97 per cent and RE by 0.69 per cent.

According to the data, a total amount of Rs.3,07,352 crore has been issued as refunds in the FY23, an increase of 37.42  per cent over the previous year.

Gross personal income tax collections (including STT) in FY23 saw one of their highest jumps ever, rising 24.23 per cent over the gross personal income tax collections of Rs.7,73,389 crore in the preceding year. The gross figure for FY23 stood at a provisional Rs.9.60 lakh crore.

Earlier in the day, sources from the CBDT told Zee Business that this time there would be a jump of nearly 16 per cent or more in the total direct tax collections, as on March 31, 2023. 

The government's indirect tax collections, under the Goods and Services Tax (GST), increased 13 per cent sequentially to Rs 1,60,122 crore in March — the second highest monthly collection since April, 2022. That took the full-year collections to Rs 18.1 lakh crore - averaging at Rs 1.51 lakh crore a month, up 22 per cent on a year-on-year basis.

Indirect tax collections in April 2022 had stood at a record Rs 1,67,540 crore.