IT publicly names defaulters owing over Rs. 400 crore taxes
The Income-Tax Department today released a pan-India list of 24 defaulting individuals and companies who owe about Rs. 490 crore in taxes to the exchequer but have either gone untraceable or have reported inadequate assets for payment of dues. It issued an advertisement as part of its name and shame defaulters policy in newspapers titled "List of defaulters of Income Tax and Corporate Tax".
Notice issued for defaulters to pay their tax arrears immediately
The notice, issued by a nodal office of the Principal Director General of Income Tax in Delhi, "advised" the named defaulters to pay their tax arrears immediately. The public announcement carries the identity of the firm or the individual, the name of their directors and partners, the date of incorporation of the company (date of birth in case of individuals), their PAN details.
Most defaulting firms are from the business sectors
Along with the firm and individuals identity, the public announcement also carries the defaulters' Tax Deduction Account Number (TAN), their last known address and business profile, the amount of tax-defaulted, assessment year, and the respective jurisdictional I-T authority. These defaulting firms were in the business sectors like food processing, bullion trading, software, real estate, breweries and manufacture of ingots among others.
Some defaulters have not paid their taxes from 1989-90
The maximum tax dues of over Rs. 86.27 crore is against a Delhi-based company named M/s Stock Guru, India and its partner Lokeshwar Dev and the notice said the assessee has gone untraceable and has inadequate assets to pay the income tax. The dues for this firm are for the assessment years 2009-10 and 2010-11. Some defaulters have not paid their taxes from 1989-90.
Public list aimed to make people aware about the defaulters
The total tax default amount by 24 entities, from cities like Ahmedabad, Guwahati, Vijayawada, Nashik, Surat, Delhi, Vadodara, Kolkata and others, is about Rs. 490 crore. A senior I-T Department official said the public list is aimed to make people aware so that they can help the department in nabbing these defaulters if they have any information about them.
The notice also carried a disclaimer
The disclaimer said, "The entries in the list are specific to the tax arrear/assessment year mentioned and the tax defaulter's address, business, shareholding, and management may have changed" now. The amount of default "shall further increase" after due interest is levied on it."
Earlier, the department named 96 tax defaulters
The department has carried out this exercise over the last few years and had named 96 such entities which have huge tax liabilities on them. The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) had a few years back adopted the strategy of bringing out the names of chronic defaulters in public domain and had also begun posting these names on its official website.
