AP posts record Rs 5,543 cr tax haul in April

Vijayawada: Andhra Pradesh registered its highest-ever monthly commercial tax collections in April 2026, marking a strong start to the new financial year. Technology-driven enforcement and improved compliance powered the surge, said chief commissioner of state taxes Ahmed Babu.The state recorded ₹5,543 crore in April, a 12.08% rise over ₹4,946 crore in the same month last year, despite structural challenges from GST rate rationalisation, which is estimated to cut nearly ₹8,000 crore annually.Net GST collections stood at ₹3,797 crore, up 6.83% year-on-year, while gross GST (excluding cess) touched ₹4,323 crore. The Centre's IGST settlement rose to ₹2,194 crore, nearly 13% higher than April 2025. Petroleum VAT fetched ₹1,613 crore, a sharp 26.72% increase, while professional tax collections climbed to ₹42.9 crore, aided by Aadhaar-linked enforcement."We have shown that even in a challenging tax environment, technology-driven enforcement and data intelligence can significantly improve compliance and revenues," Babu said, noting the state fetched nearly ₹600 crore more than last year in April alone.The department's strong performance was attributed to AI-driven and data-backed initiatives, including automated scrutiny systems to detect GST return mismatches, AI-based IGST input tax credit reversals, and analytics using UPI transaction data to bring unregistered businesses into the tax net. Over 20,000 high-value PAN accounts were identified for enforcement action.GST registration was integrated with discom electricity data to verify business premises, reducing fake registrations. Data sharing with labour, registration and mining departments helped detect leakages in construction, real estate and mining.Targeted enforcement drives in restaurants and online food delivery platforms, using aggregator data, uncovered instances of turnover suppression.