GST Evasion: Rs 7.08 Lakh Cr Detected in 5 Years

New Delhi, Aug 4 (PTI) Central GST field officers have detected tax evasion of about Rs 7.08 lakh crore in the last five years till 2024-25 fiscal, including input tax credit (ITC) fraud of about Rs 1.79 lakh crore, Parliament was informed on Monday.

In 2024-25 fiscal alone, over Rs 2.23 lakh crore of Goods and Services Tax (GST) evasion were detected by CGST field officers, according to the data shared by Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary in the Lok Sabha.

Of the 30,056 cases of GST evasion detected in FY'25, more than half or 15,283 cases pertained to ITC fraud, where the evasion was to the tune of Rs 58,772 crore.

In the 2023-24 fiscal, Rs 2.30 lakh crore worth GST evasion was detected by CGST field officers, involving ITC fraud of Rs 36,374 crore.

In FY'23, about Rs 1.32 lakh crore GST evasion was detected, including Rs 24,140 crore of fake ITC claims.

In FY'22 and FY'21, GST evasion stood at Rs 73,238 crore and Rs 49,384 crore respectively. This included ITC fraud of Rs 28,022 crore and Rs 31,233 crore respectively.

In the last five years (2020-21 to 2024-25), total GST evasion detected by CGST field officers stood at about Rs 7.08 lakh crore in 91,370 cases. Taxes recovered during the period by way of voluntary deposit stood at over Rs 1.29 lakh crore.

The evasion data includes ITC fraud of about Rs 1.79 lakh crore in 44,938 cases between FY'21 to FY'25.

Chaudhary said the central government and GSTN are taking various steps to prevent tax evasion, such as digitization through E-invoicing, GST analytics, highlighting of outliers based on system-flagged mismatches, providing actionable intelligence and selection of returns for scrutiny and selection of taxpayers for audit based on various risk parameters.

"These measures are helpful in safeguarding the revenue and nabbing the evaders," Chaudhary said in a written reply in the Lower House.

To a question on the actual net Central GST collection compared to the Revised Estimates (RE), Chaudhary said net CGST collection was 96.7 per cent of the RE in 2024-25 fiscal.

Net CGST includes CGST+Integrated GST+compensation cess).

Actual collection stood at over Rs 10.26 lakh crore in FY'25, as against RE of nearly Rs 10.62 lakh crore.

In FY'24, net CGST collection was over Rs 9.57 lakh crore, or 100.1 per cent of the RE of over Rs 9.56 lakh crore.