As the Centre is aiming to reduce the fiscal deficit, the Finance Minister, Mr Pranab Mukherjee, is likely to give more perspectives on indirect tax collections at the Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) meet tomorrow.

Mr Mukherjee will inaugurate the 27th Annual Conference of Chief Commissioners and Directors-General of Customs, Central Excise and Service Tax.

Later, senior officials of the CBEC will have a brainstorming session to discuss the ways to strengthen the collection of indirect levies.

The conference is being held in the backdrop of Government increasing both the excise duty and service tax by two per cent each to 12 per cent.

Tax collection target

The Government has fixed the indirect tax collection target at Rs 5.05 lakh crore for the current fiscal, an increase of about 27 per cent from 2011-12 target.

In April 2012, indirect tax collections in the form of excise duty, customs and service tax, stood at Rs 33,045 crore, up 10.4 per cent year-on-year.

Indirect tax mop-up in 2011-12 at Rs 3,92,781 crore was 99.6 per cent of the budget estimate.

Fiscal deficit

The Centre’s fiscal deficit, the difference between the Government’s total receipts and expenditure, was 5.7 per cent of GDP in 2011-12.

The Centre is aiming to bring it down to 5.1 per cent in the current fiscal.

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