Cooperative Banks to come under IT scanner

Pune, July 18 (UNI) Cooperative Banks are being brought under the tax scanner as vast amount of unaccounted money is lying with them Income Tax (IT) sources here today.

Addressing a joint press conference, Chief Commissioner IT S K Sharma and Chief Commissioner IT Pune, P C Verma said the department would not be deterred by the banks who are opposing the government decision. There is a lot of unaccounted money lying in the cooperative banks, he said adding the work has begun and data is being collected from all sources.

IT Commissioner S K Sharma further informed that following raids on educational institutions where a total of Rs 100 crore has been recovered, the department will tax the donations coming from ''anonymous sources''. Around 70-80 per cent capitation fee comes from these anonymous sources, he said.

For the purpose, necessary amendments to Section 10(23c) of the IT Act has been made, he added.

The IT department is trying to raise the number of IT assesses in the Rs 10 lakh and above category. For the year 2005-06, there are 18722 assessees in the category while in the previous year, there were 10945. The total number of assessees in 2005-06 was 2440191 while in the previous year 2004-05 there were 2364306 assesses, Mr Sharma said.

The IT department has a target of Rs 8400 crores for 2006-07. For the year 2005-06, the target was Rs 7322 crore but the achievement registered a shortfall of Rs 6710 crore, Mr Sharma said.

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