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India’s net direct tax collections surged by a massive 17.7% year-on-year to ₹19.58 crore in the fiscal year ended March 2024, surpassing even revised estimates by a wide margin, the tax department said on Sunday.

Net collections of income and corporate taxes, which make up for most of the direct taxes, in 2023-24 financial year exceeded the Budget estimates by ₹1.35 lakh crore (7.40%) and the revised estimates by ₹13,000 crore.

The government had raised the target for direct tax collection in FY24 (April 2023 to March 2024) to ₹19.45 lakh crore in the interim Budget presented on February 1.

With this, the gross tax collection target as per the revised estimate stood at ₹34.37 lakh crore for FY24.

While gross direct tax collections (provisional) for the FY 2023-24 rose 18.48% to ₹23.37 lakh crore, net proceeds (after accounting for refunds) surged 17.7% to ₹19.58 lakh crore, reflecting buoyancy in the economy and rise in income levels of individuals and corporates.

Refunds aggregating to ₹3.79 lakh crore have been issued in FY 2023-24, the CBDT said in a statement.

“The provisional figures of Direct Tax collections for the financial year (FY) 2023-24 show that net collections are at ₹19.58 lakh crore, compared to ₹16.64 lakh crore in the preceding financial year i.e. FY 2022-23,” it said, adding the Budget for 2023-24 fiscal had pegged the collections for the year at ₹18.23 lakh crore, which were revised to ₹19.45 lakh crore later.

“The provisional Direct Tax collections [net of the refunds] have exceeded the Budget Estimate by 7.40% and Revised Estimates by 0.67%,” it said.

The gross collection (provisional) of Direct Taxes (before adjusting for refunds) for the FY 2023-24 stood at ₹23.37 lakh crore, showing a growth of 18.48% over the gross collection of ₹19.72 lakh crore in FY 2022-23.

The gross corporate tax collection (provisional) in FY 2023-24 was up 13.06% to ₹11.32 lakh crore as compared to the gross corporate tax collection of ₹10 lakh crore of the preceding year.

The Net Corporate Tax collection (provisional) in FY 2023-24 at ₹9.11 lakh crore showed a growth of 10.26% over the net corporate tax collection of ₹8.26 lakh crore of the preceding year.

The Gross Personal Income Tax collection including Securities Transaction Tax (provisional) in FY 2023-24 at ₹12.01 lakh crore was up 24.26% over previous year’s collection of ₹9.67 lakh crore.

The Net Personal Income Tax collection including STT (provisional) in FY 2023-24 at ₹10.44 lakh crore showed a growth of 25.23% over preceding fiscal year’s figure of ₹8.33 lakh crore.

Refunds of ₹3.79 lakh crore have been issued in the FY 2023-24 showing an increase of 22.74% over the refunds of ₹3.09 lakh crore issued in FY 2022-23, the statement added.

Even the indirect tax collection for FY24 has exceeded the revised estimates (RE) of ₹14.84 lakh crore by “a handsome margin”, helped by a record GST mop-up, a top government official said.

CBIC chairman Sanjay Kumar Agarwal, in a letter to field officials, recently said, “I am happy to inform that the indirect tax collections for the Financial Year 2023-24, including Customs and Union Excise Duty have exceeded the Revised Estimates by a handsome margin.”