Push For Transparency: Government Makes Tax Data Public
The government decided to start publishing income tax data again, after more than a decade.
In a bid to encourage the wider use and analysis of income tax data and to increase transparency, the Indian government decided to start publishing income tax data again, after more than a decade. Recently, the Central Board of Direct Taxes published a set of statistics which are based on income tax returns filed by taxpayers for the assessment year 2012-13.
Data for the following years will also be published by the CBDT subsequently.
The data lists several types of taxpayers – such as individuals, Hindu Undivided Families, firms, Association of Persons and companies, to name a few. In the financial year 2011-12, over 3 crore returns were filed, out of which individuals accounted for 92.4 percent and companies accounted for just 1.9 percent.
Total income disclosed in the financial year 2011-12 was to the tune of Rs 21.6 lakh crore, data released by CBDT reveals. Of that, salary income for individuals stood at Rs 6.26 lakh crore - that’s 29 percent of the total income disclosed - whereas business income represents 56 percent of the total.
Although the total income disclosed in financial year 2011-12 was Rs 21,60,589 crore after loss set-offs, the gross total income stood at Rs 21,17,236 crore. The data also mentions that the aggregate tax liability was Rs 3,57,405 crore, which pegs the tax rate at around 16.54 percent, as against the peak tax rate of around 33 percent.
2.19 percent of the total filers in the same financial year showed no gross total income. 93,444 taxpayers filed an income greater than Rs 50 lakh but under Rs 1 crore. 60,612 filers showed an income ranging between Rs 1 crore and Rs 5 crore. However, those filing an income of more than Rs 500 crore stood at 193.
In terms of range of salary income, nearly 62.5 percent of the total filers filed their returns, but showed zero income. While 97.31 lakh filers showed an income of up to Rs 10 lakh, only 6 filers reported a salary income of over Rs 50 crore.
The data also shows that over 3 crore taxpayers paid zero long-term capital gains tax and a little over 2 lakh taxpayers actually filed long term capital gains. Only 4.83 lakh taxpayers filed short-term capital gains and nearly 3 crore filed for no capital gains.
2.54 crore taxpayers showed no interest income while 51.87 lakh filers showed an interest income of up to Rs 1.5 lakh.