New Delhi: The government may abolish discretionary powers of tax officers while deciding liabilities for tax evasion, NITI Aayog Vice-Chairman Arvind Panagariya said on Friday. This would deal another blow to black money hoarders who seek to influence tax officials.
“A lot of evasion of taxes happens when there’s too much discretion on the part of officers. So, we need to simplify this,” he said.
Simplification “would mean doing away with (tax) exemptions. In addition, (we need to) also define situations much more precisely so that it leaves no room for discretion for the tax officers to decide whether under such and such situations you are liable to tax, you are not liable to tax.”
Mr Panagariya told a TV channel that the stamp duty for real estate dealings may be eased, with a possible rise in on-the-book property deals.
The government was beefing up enforcement against tax cheats in the real estate sector. Concerns over the high rates of the stamp duty should be taken care of, he said.
Panagariya forsees drop in ‘too high’ stamp duty
“On real estate, we need to begin to enforce it better. But we need to address the issue of stamp duty. Is it too high,” he asked.
“If the transactions are going to come in white, probably the amount for which the transaction is taking place would rise.”
Asked whether he foresaw a drop in stamp duty, Panagariya answered “that's something we ought to have on the table”.
The Niti Aayog chief stoutly defended Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s demonetisation of the country's biggest notes, which has come under heavy attack from a host of economists.
“Stamping out corruption on a large scale has not been tried in a developing economy in the past,” Panagariya argued.
“This is the first time, where in a developing economy, a Prime Minister says that look we got to do a clean-up job here and systematically proceeds to do that.”
He described Modi's currency ban as an “essential step”. “This is the first time an economy has tried to do the clean-up job. What the step has been taken is an essential step. It is not the last step.”
Panagariya rejected Singh’s fierce criticism of the abrupt scrapping of high-denomination bills, saying the former prime minister had given no evidence to back up his contention.
