Taxation platform launch: 40 eminent persons including top industrialists, RBI Guv attend event

Launching the platform through a video conference, Modi said just 1.5 crore people pay taxes in India, which has a population of 130 crore, and urged those who owe taxes to come forward and honestly pay their dues and contribute to nation-building. Government sources said there were more than 40 distinguished people from different walks of life including from industry, business, banks, judicial and autonomous bodies and the government and leading economists who participated in the event via video conference.

Industrialist Ratan Tata, RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das, Tata Sons Chairman N Chandrasekaran were among the 40 distinguished persons from industry, banks and autonomous bodies who attended launch of platform 'Transparent Taxation - Honoring The Honest' by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday. Launching the platform through a video conference, Modi said just 1.5 crore people pay taxes in India, which has a population of 130 crore, and urged those who owe taxes to come forward and honestly pay their dues and contribute to nation-building.

Government sources said there were more than 40 distinguished people from different walks of life including from industry, business, banks, judicial and autonomous bodies and the government and leading economists who participated in the event via video conference.  Participants included luminaries like veteran industrialist Adi Godrej, Infosys Founder Narayana Murthy, Aditya Birla Group Chairman Kumar Mangalam Birla, Bharti Airtel Chairman Sunil Mittal, Mahindra Group Chairman Anand Mahindra, Adi Godrej, CII President Uday Kotak, Ficci President Sangita Reddy, PDHCCI President D K Agarwal and Assocham President Niranjan Hiranandani. Sources said RIL Chairman Mukesh Ambani and Adani Group Chairman Gautam Adani could not attend the event as both of them were occupied with some other pre-scheduled programmes and expressed their regret while appreciating the launch and efforts of the Income Tax Department.

SEBI Chief Ajay Tyagi, IRDAI Chief S C Khuntia, Niti Aayog Vice Chairman Rajiv Kumar, Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant and ITAT President Justice PP Bhatt were also attended the event. Besides, heads of all major banks including SBI, PNB, IDBI, CanaraBank, UBI, Indian Bank, Bank of Baroda; and leading economists Shekhar Shah, Partha Mukhopadhyay, Nitin Desai, Shankar Acharya, and Arvind Virmani were present.   The presidents of India's three accounting bodies ICAI, ICWAI and ICSI also attended the event.  The 'Transparent Taxation -- Honoring the Honest' platform launched by Modi is launched with the key objectives of bringing in transparency, efficiency and accountability. Apart from launching faceless assessment, the I-T department has adopted a taxpayers' charter beginning Thursday. Faceless Appeals will begin from September 25.

Within two hours of launch, the platform hashtag #HonoringTheHonest was trending at No. 1 nationally for a long time and was at No. 5 in worldwide trends on Twitter. This created a sort of record in the most successful social media campaigns where no hashtag has broken into top 5 Globally in last 3 years, sources said..