Do you think that the biggest income of the government comes from corporate tax? If yes, then these figures may surprise you. A large part of the government’s direct tax collection comes from personal income tax, while the growth of corporate tax has lagged in gaining momentum.
How much is the government earning from personal income tax?
In the financial year 2024-25 (till March 16, 2025), the government’s net direct tax collection reached Rs 21.26 lakh crore, which is 13% more than the same period last year.
The biggest contribution to this was from personal income tax, which reached Rs 11.01 lakh crore with a growth of 17.5%.
The growth of corporate tax was only 7%, and the government got Rs 9.8 lakh crore from this.
Securities Transaction Tax (STT)—that is, the tax collected from transactions in the stock market—reach Rs 53,095 crore with a tremendous growth of 55.6%.
Also read: March 2025 Tax Alert: Miss these deadlines and you could lose exemptions, face fines
Government’s increasing dependence on individual taxpayers
Experts say that now the government’s tax collection is becoming more dependent on personal income tax and STT rather than corporate tax.
The biggest example of this is that the government has set a target of personal income tax collection of Rs 12.57 lakh crore for the financial year 2025-26, which is 14% more than this year.
The interesting thing is that due to the new tax rates and exemptions, the government is going to lose revenue of about Rs 1 lakh crore, but still, it has increased the target of personal income tax.
Is the burden of tax falling more on the general public?
If we look at the figures from last year, this trend becomes more clear. In the financial year 2023-24, the government collected direct tax of Rs 19.58 lakh crore, which was 17.7% more than last year.
In this, personal income tax (including STT) increased by 24.26% to Rs 12.01 lakh crore, while corporate tax increased by only 13.06% to Rs 11.32 lakh crore.
It is clear from these figures that the tax growth of the government now rests more on the money of common taxpayers than on big industrialists.
Also read: Income Tax crackdown!
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