Gold amnesty scheme soon to overcome limited success of earlier IDS

Agencies
October 31, 2019

New Delhi, Oct 31: The government may soon announce an amnesty scheme for gold to bring hordes of black money used in buying the yellow metal considered a safe investment option in India.

According to sources, the new amnesty scheme would allow gold hoarders to come clean on investment made using black money by declaring their possession and paying tax on it.

The tax will have to be paid on entire value of gold declared by an individual that has been purchased without any receipt.

Though the rate of tax is yet to be worked out by the government, sources indicated that the thinking is to keep the rate at around 30 per cent level with an effective rate of around 33 per cent including education cess.

The new scheme is being considered as yet another attempt to unearth lakhs of crores of black money still lying in the system in the form of unaccounted gold.

It would also try to overcome limited success of an earlier amnesty scheme Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana (PMGKY), also known as IDS-II, launched in 2017, post the demonetisation exercise.

"The idea of the scheme is good but its effective implementation is difficult. People have amassed gold over times and on many occasions the yellow metal has been inherited leaving no transactional details.

"It would be hard to push people to declare if they have lost almost a third of the value," said an analyst who did not wish to be named as he was not aware of contours of the amnesty scheme.

Also, there is fear that after declaration of the wealth, an individual may be prone to harassment by tax officials.

It happened during the last two income declaration schemes (IDS) where tax officials were found to be seeking response from people making declarations to explain their source of income. In fact, lakhs of SMSs were sent by tax officials seeking response from cash depositors during the time of demonetisation.

The industry had suggested a new model for gold amnesty scheme to ensure its success as paying up front taxes on the value assets would attract few takers.

It had said that in return for declared gold, the government could issue 10 year zero coupon bonds with yield on it lower than prevailing rates. The gap in yield could take care of the tax that the declarer has not paid on the black money used to buy gold.

Just like the Income Tax amnesty scheme, this gold amnesty scheme is also expected to be open for a definite time period.

It is being worked out as part of a comprehensive gold policy that is being worked upon per Niti Aayog's suggestions two years ago.

It is estimated that the total stock of gold held by Indians will be in the region of 20,000 tonne. However the actual holding after taking into account unaccounted imports, ancestral holdings etc should actually be in the region of 25,000-30,000 tonne.

The value of this gold at current prices will be in excess of $1 trillion and $1.5 trillion respectively.

One of the charges that the Opposition levelled against the Modi government in this year's general elections was about failure of the Centre on bringing back black money.

The gold scheme would be yet another attempt to channelise a large portion of undeclared wealth into normal channels.

The Modi government has taken a slew of decisions ever since it came to power to clamp down on black money -- one of the main planks in General Election of 2014.

It has brought amnesty schemes for both black money held in foreign countries and domestically. The fight in November 2016 culminated to demonetising the high value Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes.

The government hoped that time that out of Rs 15.4 lakh crore of these notes being in circulation, about Rs 2-3 lakh crore may not be deposited in bank accounts as this was black money.

However, this never happened as almost entire quota of outlawed notes were deposited in bank accounts casting doubts over efficacy of the move.

The government is unperturbed from it and plans to take more measures to clamp down on black money. In the case of gold, it is expected to go a lot softer on holders of unaccounted wealth.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
July 1,2020

New Delhi, Jul 1: 18,653 COVID-19 cases have been reported in India in the last 24 hours, taking the country's tally of coronavirus cases to 5,85,493, informed the Union Health and Family Welfare Ministry on Wednesday.

As per the Ministry, there are presently 2,20,114 active cases in the country. The number of patients cured/discharged and migrated stands at 3,47,979.

507 deaths due to COVID-19 were reported in the last 24 hours taking the total deaths due to the virus to 17,400.

According to the ministry, Maharashtra is the worst-affected state by the virus with 1,74,761 cases including 7,855 fatalities.

Tamil Nadu is the second worst-hit state with 90,167 cases including 1,201 deaths. Meanwhile, Delhi has a total of 87,360 cases.

The Indian Council of Medical Research said that a total number of 86,26,585 tested up to June 30 of which 2,17,931 samples were tested on Tuesday.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
January 20,2020

New Delhi, Jan 20: Surging inflation and slowing growth are raising serious concerns about the future growth prospects of the economy and as a remedial measure the government should resolve supply-side hurdles and ensure more stringent governance norms, a report said on Monday.

According to the Dun and Bradstreet Economy forecast, even though the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) turned positive in November 2019, it is likely to remain subdued.

"Slowdown in consumption and investment along with high inflationary pressures, geopolitical issues and uncertainty over the recovery of the economic growth are likely to keep IIP subdued," the report noted.

Dun and Bradstreet expect IIP to remain around 1.5-2.0 percent during December 2019.

As per government data, industrial output grew 1.8 percent in November, turning positive after three months of contraction, on account of growth in the manufacturing sector.

On the price front, uneven rainfall along with floods in many states and geopolitical issues have led to a surge in headline inflation even as demand remains muted.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) in December rose to about five-and-half year high of 7.35 percent from 5.54 percent in November, mainly driven by high vegetable prices.

"The sharp rise in inflation has constrained monetary policy stimulus while revenue shortfall has placed limits on the government expenditure," Dun & Bradstreet India Chief Economist Arun Singh said.

According to Singh, growth-supporting measures and deceleration in growth are likely to cause slippage in fiscal deficit target by a wider margin.

"The government should focus on taking small steps to address the slowdown; in particular, resolve the supply-side hurdles and ensure more stringent governance norms," Singh said.

Unless these concerns are addressed through a comprehensive policy framework, it will not be easy for India to clock a sustainable growth rate to become a USD 5 trillion economy, he added.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
March 9,2020

New Delhi, Mar 9: The Delhi Police Special Cell on Monday arrested a PFI member Danish from UP''s Moradabad for allegedly spreading fake propaganda during anti- CAA protests.

"Danish was the head of the Counter Intelligence Wing of PFI and has been actively participating in the anti-CAA protest across the city," sources in the Delhi Police Special Cell said.

Sources further claimed that his arrest has given clues regarding the Information war by the Popular Front of India (PFI).

The FIR related to the protest was filed by the Crime Branch but since the larger conspiracy regarding the Delhi riots is being probed by the Cell, the matter has been transferred to them.

Delhi Police Special Cell had on Sunday arrested a Kashmiri couple from Okhla for alleged links with Islamic State (IS) Khorasan module.

The couple have been identified as Jahanjeb Sami (husband) and Hinda Bashir Beg (wife). The police have seized some objectionable material from them and were interrogating them.

When asked about the couple, the sources said, "Officers of CERT-In are analysing the Eight Mobile phones and Laptop of the couple to question them further."

The couple being an active member of ISJ&K was operating from the Valley but later shifted their base to Delhi post internet clampdown.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.