Income tax dept sets up compliance management cell to track evaders

Under its business intelligence project, the government also plans to develop an integrated platform for effective utilization of available and accessible information to promote voluntary compliance and deter non-compliance. Photo: Mint



Live Mint :Remya Nair  :: Tue, May 21 2013. 12 45 PM IST

Dept is also sending 70,000 letters to individuals who have been tracked through its business intelligence project

New Delhi: Stepping up its efforts to track tax evaders, the income-tax (I-T) department has set up a compliance management cell that will specifically track their tax payments and return filings. The tax department is also sending an additional 70,000 letters to individuals who have been tracked through its business intelligence project.

Under the business intelligence project, the department monitors high-value transactions bank deposits, bonds purchases and credit card bills above Rs.2 lakh—all linked through the permanent account number—and checks whether these individuals have filed income-tax returns. The department had sent out more than 100,000 letters in the last few months to check if the individual had filed a tax return or not.

“Preliminary assessment of the results show that a large number of taxpayers have filed return of income and paid self-assessment tax after initiation of this exercise. Taxes of more than Rs.600 crore has been paid as self-assessment tax and advance tax by the target segment in last three months,” the government said in a statement. The compliance management cell will help the government to take effective follow-up action.

Under its business intelligence project, the government also plans to develop an integrated platform for effective utilization of available and accessible information to promote voluntary compliance and deter non-compliance. The platform will integrate enterprise data warehouse, data mining, web mining, and other such tools for effective outcomes.