According to latest estimates, the actual direct-tax collections during the last financial year amounted to Rs 45,723 crore against the revised estimates of Rs 49,400 crore and budget estimates of Rs 48,400 crore.

The performance, according to officials, was still laudable keeping in view the prevailing economic scenario. The shortfall over the budgetary estimates worked out to be Rs 2,677 crore whereas against the revised estimates it amounted to Rs 3,677 crore.

Impressed by the buoyancy in the direct-tax mopup during the fiscal, finance minister Yashwant Sinha in his budget indicated that the direct-tax realisation would surpass the budget target. In his budget, the minister took credit of the Rs 49,400 crore direct-tax mopup against the initial budget estimate of Rs 48,400 crore.

However, the actual collection fellshort of the expectations of the minister and the realisation totalled only Rs 45,723 crore.

More importantly, the shortfall has been quite substantial in case of corporation tax. The revenue department aimed to mop up Rs 26,550 crore as corporation tax and in January-February 1999 felt that Rs 27,050 crore could be garnered. However, the actual collection turned out to be only Rs 24,404 crore.

In two regions, namely Bangalore and Patna, the corporation-tax collection was lower than what was recorded in the previous financial year. The collection in Bangalore fell to Rs 698.80 crore during 1998-99 compared with Rs 746.07 crore in 1997-98. Similarly, in case of Patna region, collections went down to Rs 469.22 crore from Rs 525.01 crore in 1997-98. The other regions, however, witnessed a positive growth.

When compared with the budgetary target for 1998-99, 11 out of 15 regions witnessed a shortfall. These include Ahmedabad (shortfall of Rs 315.33 crore), Bangalore (Rs 204.20 crore), Mumbai (Rs 322.31crore), Calcutta (Rs 515.78 crore), Cochin (Rs 44.43 crore), Hyderabad (Rs 60.80 crore), Jaipur (Rs 25.15 crore), Delhi (Rs 516.76 crore), Chandigarh (Rs 43.18 crore), Pune (Rs 211.78 crore) and Patna (Rs 147.78 crore). The regions which managed to achieve and surpass the budget targets in case of corporation tax include Bhopal (Rs 25 crore), Chennai (Rs 27.84 crore), Kanpur (Rs 152.53 crore) and Lucknow (Rs 40.16 crore). As far as income-tax collection was concerned, the actuals turned out to be Rs 20,102 crore against the revised estimates of Rs 21,430 crore and budget estimates of 20,930 crore.

The shortfall over the budget target was witnessed in 14 out of 15 regions, amounting to Rs 828 crore over the budget estimates. The shortfall in the income-tax collection worked out to be Rs 828 crore compared with budget estimates. Whereas against the revised estimates, the shortfall mounted to Rs 1,328 crore. The only region which did well in case of income-tax collection was Delhi. The total realisation in theregion was of the order of Rs 3,353.67 crore against the targeted Rs 2,973 crore. However, in case of interest-tax, total collection was Rs 1,217 crore against the budgetary target of Rs 920 crore.