The demonetisation deadline ends on December 30, and a day later, the I-T officers are expected to complete their scrutiny assessment work.
New Delhi: Even if just one per cent of the total 40 crore bank accounts are red-flagged as “suspicious” during analysis by the Income-Tax department after sifting through data made available to it by banks, the tax officers would be saddled with a staggering 40 lakh cases requiring scrutiny.
“This has never happened before,” said an I-T official, who did not wish to be named. The humongous scope of the work and the increased possibility of ordinary and honest taxpayers being harassed has raised concerns in the business and chartered accountant community.
Sources in the I-T department said while there are about 8,000 officers who can undertake assessment work, only 4,000 are available, with the rest on assignment elsewhere, including in administration, audit, headquarters and systems. “Even these 4,000 are handling scrutiny assessment for Income-Tax assessment year 2014-15,” said an I-T official.
The demonetisation deadline ends on December 30, and a day later, the I-T officers are expected to complete their scrutiny assessment work. The government has already asked banks to furnish a statement of financial transactions on deposits of over Rs 50,000 in Jan Dhan accounts, over Rs 2,50,000 in savings bank accounts and over Rs 12.5 lakh in current accounts to the I-T department before January 31.
According to the I-T department, it picks out approximately 3,20,000 cases for scrutiny in a year. So, each officer authorised (about 4,000 available now) to make assessments handles about 80 cases on an average. But 40 lakh cases for scrutiny would mean 12.5 times the current workload for each officer.
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