At nearly Rs 1.24 lakh crore, the Goods and Services Tax (GST) revenue collection in March 2021 was the highest since the tax system’s introduction in July 2017, the government said on Thursday. The March collection was up 27 per cent when compared with the tax mop-up in the year-ago period.

“GST revenues during March 2021 are the highest since introduction of GST. In line with the trend of recovery in the GST revenues over the past five months, the revenues for the month of March 2021 are 27 per cent higher than the GST revenues in the same month last year,” the Ministry of Finance said in a statement.

The ministry also added that the GST revenues were above Rs 1 lakh crore for the last six months, and a steep increasing trend over this period is a clear indicator of rapid economic recovery post-pandemic.

“Closer monitoring against fake-billing, deep data analytics using data from multiple sources, including GST, Income Tax and Customs IT systems and effective tax administration have also contributed to the steady increase in tax revenue over the last few months,” the ministry said.

Of the total GST revenue collected, CGST was Rs 22,973 crore, SGST was Rs 29,329 crore, IGST was Rs 62,842 crore (including Rs 31,097 crore collected on import of goods) and Cess accounted for Rs 8,757 crore (including Rs 935 crore collected on import of goods), the ministry added.