The government will set up Income Tax (I-T) overseas units in eight more countries, including the US and Britain, to help exchange tax-related information.
This is likely to be announced by finance minister Pranab Mukherjee tomorrow at a two-day annual conference of chief commissioners and director generals of income tax, a key source said. Currently, income tax overseas units are located in Singapore and Mauritius.
The overseas units would also be established in the Netherlands, Japan, Cyprus, Germany, France and the UAE.
"The I-T overseas units would be created to streamline exchange of information with treaty partners," source added.
The conference would discuss renegotiation of double taxation avoidance agreement (DTAA) with various countries in the light of the requirement to have effective exchange of information, particularly bank-related agreements.
The government has approached 65 countries for DTAA renegotiation. With Switzerland, it has recently completed its renegotiation.
The issue of renegotiation of tax treaties assumes importance, since the matter of money allegedly stashed away by Indians in foreign banks became a scoring point in the past general elections.
The conference will also look for ways to meet the direct tax collection target of Rs 4.30 lakh crore despite several concessions declared in the budget. "The collection target becomes stiff in view of relief and concessions announced in budget 2010 involving direct tax outgo of about Rs 26,000 crore," an official statement said.
The budget estimates 2010-11 have pegged direct tax collections at Rs 4,30,000 crore at a growth of 16.2 per cent over the budget estimates for 2009-10. "The conference will deliberate strategies to achieve the tax collection target," the statement said.
Improving taxpayer services will be another area of concern, the department said. The I-T department has taken several steps to improve the delivery of taxpayer services by introducing schemes such as e-filing of returns and e-payment of taxes. To make the tax administration more efficient and effective, the meet will deliberate upon organisational changes including augmenting manpower and delegation of financial powers.
The conference will be held at a time when the finance ministry is likely to issue amended draft of direct taxes code soon and may address the issue of taxing long-term savings at the time of withdrawal among other matters.
