A clutch of financial institutions, including SBI, LIC and HDFC, have showed double digit growth in terms of advance tax payments for March quarter, say industry sources.
Despite weak credit growth, State Bank of India paid 23 per cent more in advance tax at about Rs 1,794 crore (Rs 17.94 billion) for the March quarter compared to around Rs 1,456 crore (Rs 14.56 billion) a year-ago, they said, adding that SBI paid Rs 1,425 crore (Rs 14.25 billion) in the December quarter.
Similarly, Life Insurance Corporation of India paid Rs 1,470 crore (Rs 14.70 billion), an increase of 15 per cent over Rs 1,280 crore (Rs 12.80 billion) in the same period last year. For the full fiscal, the insurance behemoth has paid Rs 5,880 crore as against Rs 5,100 crore in the last financial year.
Advance tax is a system of staggered payment of taxes by high earning corporates and individuals spread across four quarters. In the second quarter, corporates pay 30 per cent of their year's overall tax outgo. It is generally taken as a barometer of a company's performance for a particular period.
Since the past many quarters, the I-T Department has not been sharing advance tax numbers.
State-run lender IDBI Bank, however, has paid only Rs 230 crore (Rs 2.3 billion) in advance tax for the fourth quarter, which is 23 per cent lower than Rs 298 crore (Rs 2.98 billion) paid in the same period last year, said the sources. In the previous quarter (Q3), the bank had forked out Rs 386 crore (Rs 3.86 billion) to the IT Department.
Mortgage lender HDFC paid 10 per cent more at about Rs 550 crore in Q4, up from Rs 500 crore a year ago, while for the full fiscal it has shelled out Rs 2,435 crore (Rs 24.35 billion) , up 12.8 per cent from last fiscal's Rs 2,160 crore (Rs 21.60 billion).
Rural development lender Nabard has paid around Rs 380 crore (Rs 3.8 billion) in the reporting quarter, marginally up from Rs 370 crore (Rs 3.7 billion), and for the fiscal its outgo stood at about Rs 1,560 crore (Rs 15.60 billion), up from Rs 1,490 crore (Rs 14.90 billion), according to the sources.
Private lender Yes Bank paid Rs 60 crore (Rs 600 million) higher advance tax at Rs 260 crore (Rs 2.6 billion) in the quarter compared with Rs 200 crore (Rs 2 billion) last year. United India Insurance paid Rs 25 crore, same as last year. However, in the December quarter, the state-run general insurer had given Rs 20 crore (Rs 200 million).
In third quarter, the corporate tax payout growth had remained muted from Mumbai, which contributes the lion's share of the total levy, reflecting the poor shape of the economy.
The I-T department has a target to mop up Rs 2.30 trillion from the financial capital this fiscal out of the direct tax collection target of Rs 7.36 trillion for FY15.
For the April-December period, gross direct tax collection rose 12.93 per cent at Rs 5.47 trillion against a target of 19 per cent across the country.
However, for the September quarter, advance tax collections were close to the targeted 17 per cent growth from the metropolis.
