New Delhi Aug 1 (IANS) Revenue collection under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) crossed the Rs 95 000 crore mark in July for the second month in a row and stood at Rs 96 483 crore the government said on Wednesday.

The government said the revenue was broadly on expected lines and that Rs 3 899 crore was released to the states as GST compensation for the months of April and May.

The GST revenue collected till July 31 was for the month of June and it was significantly higher than the average monthly collection of Rs 89 885 crore during 2017-18. It was also higher than Rs 95 610 crore collected in June (for the month of May).

The government said in a statement that out of the total GST collection Rs 15 877 crore was collected as Central-GST (CGST) Rs 22 293 crore as state-GST (SGST) and Rs 49 951 crore as integrated-GST (IGST) which included Rs 24 852 crore collected on imports. Additionally Rs 8 362 crore was collected as cess.

The total number of GST returns filed till July 31 was 66 lakh compared to 64.69 lakh returns filed in the previous month it added.

--IANS vv/qd/sed