Jaitley not keen on a complete rollback in EPF tax

New Delhi, March 7: Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley is not in favour of a partial rollback in the issue of imposing tax on Employees' Provident Fund (EPF). He is expected to make a statement on this in Parliament on Tuesday (March 8).

It was earlier decided that Jaitley would speak on this in his reply speech but sources in the Finance Ministry said the grievance, which has been created among the salaried class because of this move, needs to be addressed fast.

Following Prime Minister Narendra Modi's intervention in the issue after a controversy broke out over taxing EPF, it was felt that the Finance Ministry would roll back the decision completely. But sources in the ministry said it was only considering a partial rollback.

Tax interest on PF instead?

According to sources, the interest accumulated on 60 per cent of the amount in PF account could be taxed instead of the amount itself.

However, the labour ministry has reportedly questioned this idea, saying it would lead to a more complicated procedure of separating the accumulated fund from the interest to determine the tax. And this procedure would see the government earning only around Rs 200 crore.

Oneindia News