New Delhi, July 15: Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Tuesday said that New Delhi has initiated a dialogue with Swiss authorities to obtain information on Indian black money stashed away in banks there — an issue that had raised much political heat during the elections with BJP leader L K Advani making it a major poll plank.
Mukherjee, at the same time, said the Government has no plans to bring in a new amnesty scheme for tax evaders, pointing out that in the past there have been complaints that the government was penalising the honest tax payer as in every such scheme the normal rate of tax was reduced. Efforts to amend the Indo-Mauritius tax treaty to curb its abuse, however, are being pursued, he said.
Mukherjee said Swiss banks had until now taken a position that they would not divulge information but as a consequence of global meltdown, there is pressure by OECD countries to bring in more transparency and revision of the Avoidance of Double Taxation Agreements.
“I am told that the Swiss authorities have ultimately agreed to enter into negotiations,” he told the Rajya Sabha while claiming that the government is working to revise Double Tax Avoidance Agreements, particularly the secrecy clause, which it has with other countries.
“It is an international commitment. Unilaterally, we cannot simply ignore it. If we ignore it, then further sources of information will be dried out. We are, therefore, negotiating with them,” he said.
As far as the new amnesty scheme is concerned, he said, “We are not very enamoured to have another type of disclosure scheme,” adding that the government was in talks with Mauritius to amend the tax treaty to check companies evading paying taxes in both countries. Delhi has also offered to compensate the Mauritius for any loss in revenues because of a change in the treaty.
–Agencies