Direct taxes are major resource for undertaking development work: Pranab Mukherjee

New Delhi, Feb 26(ANI): Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Saturday said that direct taxes are now the major resource provider to the Central Government for undertaking developmental work.

Mukherjee said that direct taxes collections have grown at an average annual rate of 24 percent in the last five years and has nearly trebled from Rs.1,32,771 crore in financial year 2004-05 to about Rs.3,78,000 crore in financial year 2009-10.

He said that direct taxes' share in GDP has also increased from 4.1 percent to 6.1 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

Mukherjee also said that direct taxes collections have registered a growth of 20 percent during the current year so far and have reached nearly Rs.3,35,000 crores.

He said that this sustained growth has been possible due to rationalization of tax structure, improvement in tax administration and persistent efforts of the employees of income tax department.

The Finance Minister was speaking at a function in the national capital after releasing the commemorative coins in denomination of Rs.150 and Rs.5 to mark the completion of year long celebrations of 150 years of income tax.

The function was also attended by Minister of State Revenue S. S. Planimanickam, Finance Secretary Sushma Nath, Chief Economic Adviser Dr. Kaushik Basu, Revenue Secretary Sunil Mitra, Secretary of Economic Affairs R.Gopalan and senior officials of the Finance Ministry among others. (ANI)