UT to crack down on benami transactions

Ramkrishan Upadhyay

Tribune news service

Chandigarh, May 18

In order to curb benami transactions and black money, the Chandigarh Administration has taken a step which will help the government to identify banks accounts opened with ulterior motives of concealing unaccountable money.

Sources said Deputy Commissioner Ajit Balaji Joshi recently directed all the banks to start a drive to link bank accounts with the Aadhaar numbers of the account holders. The direction has been issued at a meeting with the representatives of the banks held recently.

Joshi said the city with the population of approximately 11 lakh had more than 33 lakh bank accounts, which was much higher than the national average. This showed that on an average, every Chandigarh resident had three bank accounts. Joshi said the Administration was committed to putting an end to black money in the country. Sources said linking the accounts with the Aadhaar number would also help the Administration and enable residents to access government services, right from applying for a driving licence to registering a property deed through Aadhar numbers in future. This will also put an end to malpractices and fraud.

Sources said with this people would not be able to buy properties in just about anybody’s name. Income tax authorities could easily check if the person in whose name a property was purchased had declared the income in his tax returns. An officer of the UT Administration said that the Government of India was already stressing the need for making 12-digit unique identity number a new weapon in the fight against black money, put an end to benami transactions and check frauds. Ajay Jagga, a social worker, said the step was in the right direction for curbing black money.