🔑 In one line

The government says August GST growth was 14.8%. A former Finance Secretary says it's really 4.08% once you count last year's cess. Both numbers are technically correct — they're just measuring different things.

₹1.99 L Cr
Aug 2026 gross GST
14.8%
Official YoY growth
4.08%
Disputed comparable growth

What actually happened

Gross GST collections for August 2026 came in at ₹1,99,853 crore — up 14.8% from ₹1,74,116 crore a year earlier. The government pointed to it as evidence of resilient consumption. Then former Finance Secretary Subhash Chandra Garg publicly disputed the number, arguing it was inflated because the 2025-26 GST Compensation Cess had been left out of last year's comparison base.

📉
The challenge
Garg's argument
Add August 2025's ₹11,782 crore of compensation cess back into last year's base, and August growth drops to 7.51%. Across April–August (five months), official gross growth of 11% becomes 4.08% on a like-for-like basis — and net growth (after refunds) falls to just 1.30%, which he called "a pathetic performance."
📊
The rebuttal
CBIC & SBI's response
CBIC says the comparison is "apples and oranges" — compensation cess was formally discontinued from 22 September 2025 (and on tobacco, from 1 February 2026) as part of the GST 2.0 restructuring. Adding back a levy that no longer exists in this year's numbers doesn't measure the actual tax base, they argue. SBI's Group Chief Economic Advisor Soumya Kanti Ghosh separately called the comparison a distortion, pointing to base effects and describing it as "sleight of the left hand."

Why both sides can be "right"

What you countGrowth rate
Official gross GST (cess already excluded both years)14.8% (Aug), 11% (5-month)
Adding back last year's now-discontinued cess7.51% (Aug), 4.08% (5-month)
Net collections (after refunds), comparable basis~1.30% (5-month, per Garg's calculation)
The underlying rupee figures aren't actually disputed by either side — ₹1.99 lakh crore gross, ₹1.68 lakh crore net for August are agreed facts. The disagreement is purely about which comparison base is the "correct" one to measure growth against, given the tax structure itself changed mid-year.

What this means for your business

This debate is about macro reporting methodology, not about any rate or compliance change for individual businesses. Nothing here affects your GST rate, filing deadlines, or ITC eligibility. It's worth understanding mainly because you'll likely see both the 14.8% and 4% figures cited in the press — now you know why they don't match.

Focus on your own numbers, not the headlines

Convert your GST invoices into clean, structured Excel data — GSTIN, HSN, and tax split in seconds.

Try GST Converter Free →