Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has said that the number of people filing tax returns in India is likely to double to 7.6 crore during 5 years of present government due to initiatives like rationalisation of tax structure, lowering of rates and anti-black money measures. He said “If we look at the functioning of the direct tax department, various factors like strict compliance, rationalisation of tax structure, lowering the lowest slab, and the result of that has been...we are finding 15-20 per cent gradual increase in the tax collections every year.”
The minister has stated that the number of direct taxpayers were 3.8 crore when the present government took office in May 2014. He said “four years ago, when we assumed office the total number of people who filed tax returns in India was 3.80 crore.” He also noted that it is already 6.86 crore last year, which is the fourth year and at the end of fifth year it will be something close to 7.6 crore or 7.5 crore.
Jaitley further attributed the increase in number of direct taxpayers to initiatives of the government like anti-black money measures, formalisation of economy, use of technology, ability to detect transactions. He pointed out that these initiatives have also led to increase in tax collections by 15-20 per cent. He added that compliance has also improved as the tax slabs have been lowered.