GST Network Improved Over Last 5 years: Report

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A report by the Economic Advisory Council to the PM (EAC-PM) has said that performance of the GST Network, the IT backbone for the indirect tax regime, has improved over the last five years. It suggested that ChatGPT-type language-capable software could be deployed to make chatbot GITA improve responses. The report by EAC-PM member Sanjeev Sanyal and Pankaj Dikshit, CTO at Government e-Marketplace (GeM), has looked at multiple parameters, including compliance by assessees, to conclude that GSTN is more robust now.

At the end of December 2022, 76% of taxpayers filed their returns on time, but the paper has suggested that there was scope for further improvement as VAT or GST compliance in 44 countries was in the region of 86%, according to an OECD report. “Is it the case that the system would benefit from some specific simplification in the process or a ‘nudge’?” it asked.

On almost all parameters, the performance seems to have improved. For instance, against more than 20 lakh calls or queries received in the first quarter of the GST launch, there are only 2 lakh now. This is despite the taxpayer base growing 3. 7 times from around 38 lakh when GST was implemented in July 2017 to over 1. 4 crore at the end of December 2022. So, the average complaint rate has declined from over 2. 37 lakh in first quarter of 2018 to around 17,000 in the last quarter of 2022.