Over 1bn people, but only 5 cr pay tax

NEW DELHI:In a first, the Central Board of Direct Taxes has made public data on the total number of taxpayers in the country, income disclosed in returns by various categories of taxpayers and the number of permanent account number (PAN) holders in the country for a chosen period of time.

New Delhi, April 29

In a first, the Central Board of Direct Taxes has made public data on the total number of taxpayers in the country, income disclosed in returns by various categories of taxpayers and the number of permanent account number (PAN) holders in the country for a chosen period of time.

It said the objective of publishing these statistics was to encourage “wider use and analysis of income-tax data by departmental personnel and academicians”.

The time-series data between fiscal 2001 and fiscal 2015 discloses the actual direct taxes collection achieved by the department; direct tax to gross domestic product ratio; the cost of collecting revenue for the government; the number of effective assesses, and workload and disposal tax cases.

The 84-page data has been released and put in the public domain for the first time. It has been uploaded on the web portal of the department. — Agencies

50 pc smaller firms not paying taxes

New Delhi: Fifty per cent of the smaller firms were not paying taxes and the government was keeping a tab on such entities to ensure there was no tax evasion, the Lok Sabha was informed today.

Minister of State for Finance Jayant Sinha said the government had taken “revolutionary steps” to ensure there was no tax evasion and steps had been taken to increase tax collection.

Things have improved as far as prevention of tax evasion was concerned, he said while replying to questions.

Referring to smaller firms, Sinha said 50 per cent of them did not pay taxes and the government was keeping a watch to ensure there was no evasion. To ensure compliance, stringent action was being taken, he said.

The minister said there were 25 crore households in the country, out of which 18 crore were in rural areas.

Out of the seven crore households in the urban areas, nearly half could not pay tax and the total eligible households that came under the tax net were between four to six crore.

To a query on people trying to evade taxes by showing their income as “agriculture income”, Sinha said the scope of such evasion was less.

He said a series of recommendations have been received and the government has benefitted greatly by the suggestions of the SIT. —PTI