How have direct tax collections for 2019-20 been affected by the COVID-19 shutdown?

While the fall in tax collections can be partly attributed to the COVID-19, a large part of the problem has been on for over 6 months due to a clear slowdown in the economy leading to weak growth. The original estimate of direct taxes was Rs.13.35 trillion for FY20. However, that was revised lower to Rs.11.70 trillion. But the final full year collections (net of refunds) were at just Rs.9.98 trillion. Clearly that is short of the revised estimates by Rs.1.72 trillion and is short of the original estimates by 3.37 trillion. Clearly that means the fiscal deficit could shoot up much beyond the 3.8% mark for FY20. In fact, economists are already estimating that the fiscal deficit for FY21 could end up at around 6.2%. The big drop in tax collections came from the 3 major centres of Mumbai, Delhi and Bengaluru.