As per the government reports, the central government has till now collected a staggering amount of INR 4,172.44 crore as late fees for missing GST return filings by the taxpayers.
These collections are the net of the reversals and are levied onto the taxpayers for them to timely file GST returns as per the compliance. Currently, there is a late fee of INR 25 per day for the CGST & SGST late return filing.
While for the NIL tax liability taxpayers, the same penalty is INR 10 for both CGST and SGST. As per the detailed view, the Minister of State for Finance Shiv Pratap Shukla mentioned that “Late fee is levied u/s 47 of the CGST Act, 2017 on any registered person who fails to furnish returns by the GST due date at the rate of Rs. 100 every day during which such failure continues subject to the maximum amount of Rs 5,000.”
Also, the GST council meeting decided to waive off the late filing penalty for them who have to file GST returns till 31st March. As per the official statement, “Late fee shall be completely waived for all taxpayers in case of Form GSTR-1, Form GSTR-3B & Form GSTR-4 for the months/ quarters July 2017 to September 2018 are furnished after December 22, 2018, but on or before March 31, 2019.”
In case if one talks about the direct tax collection, the government achieved additional INR 50,000 crores while the GST collection falls short for around 1 lakh crore.
