ON April 1, 2019, the ministry of finance issued a statement announcing the GST collections for March 2019, the last month of the financial year 2018-19. The statement celebrated what was supposed to be the highest monthly collection since the introduction of GST – Rs 1,06,577 crores. What was, however, left out of the picture was what this collection put the final seal on – namely, that GST revenues for 2018-19 are well below the figure projected even in the revised estimates (RE) presented in the union budget 2019-20 on February 1, 2019.