The Income Tax department on Saturday revealed that those who deposited Rs 15 lakh or more were in trouble. But why? The I-T department has issued nearly two lakh notices to persons who deposited an unaccounted sum of Rs 15 lakh or more in their accounts during the period of demonetisation. Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) Chairman Sushil Chandra said, “More than Rs. 15 lakh were deposited in accounts of certain individuals, for which no returns were filed. We have identified around 1.98 lakh such accounts and sent notices to the account holders in the months of December and January. However, we have not received any response on the same. It is to be noted that failing to reply to these notices can lead to penalising by the IT department.”
Chandra added that around 3,000 cases were filed in the last three months across different areas, comprising of tax evasion, delayed tax filing, abetment and so on. In the wake of encouraging digitisation, the income tax department is focusing on e-statement, Chandra said. “This year, we introduced e-assessment on a trial basis. Nearly 60,000 e-assessments were done in three months. We expect this number to increase in the coming months.” The e-assessment process, which was recently introduced, allows online tax filing and assessment, thereby reducing the need for taxpayers to visit the income tax office for the same.
On 8 November 2016, PM Narendra Modi had announced the demonetisation of all old Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 banknotes. The government claimed that the action would curtail the shadow economy and crack down on the use of illicit and counterfeit cash to fund illegal activity and terrorism. The sudden nature of the announcement and the prolonged cash shortages in the weeks that followed created significant disruption throughout the economy, which threatened the economic output.
PM Modi announced that demonetisation in a live televised address. In the announcement, PM Modi declared that use of all Rs 500 and Rs 1000 banknotes would be invalid past midnight, and announced the issuance of new Rs 500 and Rs 2000 banknotes in exchange for the old banknotes.