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    A Bridge Too Far

    The government's fiscal math is off track. It will have to do some accounting jugglery to stick to the fiscal deficit target.
    by Dipak Mondal Dec 10, 2018 8 minutes

    In early July Piyush Goyal, then in charge of the finance ministry, exuded confidence that Goods and Services Tax, or GST, collections for the year would cross Rs 13 lakh crore, giving the government scope to rationalise tax rates. His hope is turning out to be as far from reality as it could be.

    Monthly GST collections have to be nearly Rs 1,08,000 crore for Goyal's goal to be met. They have been less than Rs 1,00,000 crore for all months this year, except September, when they were Rs 1,00,710 crore. Even the government's Budget targets require average monthly collections to top Rs 1 lakh crore. With just a few months to go for the financial year to end, the government is, in all likelihood, looking at a big hole in its finances.

    This begs a question was this fear over revenues shortfall also the trigger for its alleged demand for transfer of Rs 3.6 lakh crore from the Reserve Bank of India's, or RBI's, reserves? Though the government put up a brave face and Secretary, Department of Economic Affairs, tweeted that the "government's fiscal math is completely on track and there is no proposal to ask the RBI to transfer (Rs ) 3.6 or Rs 1 lakh crore, as speculated," numbers available till the end of November tell a different

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