Income Tax - Cash Collection of Arrears - Far Below Target - CBDT Chairman Wants Action
THE CBDT Chairman Mr. Sushil Chandra in a D.O. Letter to the Principal Chief Commissioners points out that the target of cash collection from arrear demand was fixed very modestly at Rs.53,981 crore in the Central Action Plan for 2016-17 as against very large amount of arrears outstanding. However, till the end of November, 2016, only an amount of Rs.19,686 crore has been collected, which represents only 36.47% of the target. A number of Regions are performing far lower than the national average of 36.47%, which itself is quite low. The level of performance in this critical result area of the Department's work is completely non-acceptable. Three quarters of the financial year are already over and not even 50% of the target has been achieved, which itself was fixed at a fraction of the total arrears outstanding.
The Chairman wants the Principal Chief Commissioners to take all measures for stepping up cash collections out of arrear as well as current demand so that not only the target set in this regard is met but significant contribution is also made towards achievement of the overall budget target for their Regions.
He wants all demands classified as Net Collectible Demand (NCO) to be recovered forthwith and efforts also to be made to make recoveries from categories other than NCO as per the Action Plan.
The Chairman directs:
Stay of demand may be granted prudently in the light of Instruction No. 1914 dated 21.03.1996 read with Office Memorandum dated 29.02.2016 on the subject.
1. CslT (Appeal) may be requested to dispose of such appeals on priority where demand is likely to be confirmed.
2. Post confirmation of demand, the same may be collected swiftly using all provisions of the Income-tax Act for recovery of demand.
The Chairman concludes,
The advancement of the time-barring date to 31st December was intended to provide the assessment units with dedicated time for recovery of demand raised. It is expected that the last quarter of the financial year will be effectively utilized for making recoveries from arrear and current demand and the reasonable target of cash collection fixed for the year will be achieved, if not exceeded and significant collection will be made from the current demand as well .