New Delhi: Union finance minister Arun Jaitley on Thursday credited demonetisation for a sharp jump in tax collections, and claimed that the effects of the 50-day drive were not as adverse as predicted by some critics.
“Of course, there would be areas which would be adversely impacted. But in the long term, the changes coming about in the system will mean a much larger and cleaner GDP,” he said.
As the deadline to deposit the scrapped high-value bills ends on Friday, he said that the critical phase for the economy was over, and the situation would only improve in coming weeks and months. He said that RBI would take a call on when to ease the curbs on cash withdrawals.
“The remonetisation process has substantially advanced, significantly without a single incident of unrest anywhere in the country. The Reserve Bank of India has very large amounts of currency with it now to meet the demand,” he said.
