New Delhi, Aug 17 (IANS) There is no official estimate of unaccounted money in the country as of date, but a number of steps taken by the government have led to the seizure of over Rs.786 crore of black money in the last fiscal, the Rajya Sabha was informed Tuesday.
The punitive and deterrent steps included scrutiny of returns, surveys, search and seizure action, imposition of penalty and launching of prosecution in appropriate cases, Minister of State for Finance S.S. Palanimanickam said in reply to a question on black money.
He said the other efforts to unearth black money included establishment of the Tax Information Network (TIN) as a depository of important tax related information which can be accessed by the Income Tax department.
‘The information collected from various sources is also collated electronically to create a comprehensive profile of the high net-worth assesses so as to detect tax evasion,’ he said.
‘A Computer Aided Investigation Tool (CAIT) has also been developed to scrutinise computerized books of digital evidence seized during search and survey operations,’ said Palanimanickam.
He added that ‘information as regards suspicious transactions and large cash transactions, as disseminated by the Financial Intelligence Unit, India (FIU-IND), is also investigated by the Income Tax Department.’
Putting the total amount of black money seized in 2009-10 at Rs 686.27 crore, the minister added the seizure of black money in 2007-08 and 1008-09 stood respectively at Rs.427.82 crore and Rs.50.23 crore.
The minister said ‘there is no official estimate of the extent of unaccounted money in the country as on date.’
‘At the instance of the government, the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy (NIPFP) had in 1985 conducted a study ‘Aspects of Black Money in India’ in which the amount of black money in the country in the year 1983-84 was estimated between Rs.31,584 Crore and Rs.36,786 Crore.
The authors of the study had, however, said that their estimate was based on numerous assumptions and approximations, each of which could be challenged, said the minister, adding no fresh study had been conducted subsequently by the government on the amount of black money.
