The Hans India: New Delhi: Tuesday,
September 20, 2016.
The Section
138 of Income Tax Act, 1995 deals with disclosure of information relating to
assessees, possible recipients, decision makers etc by Board or any other
authority to any officer or authority or body performing functions under any
other law as notified by the Central government, if necessary, in public
interest, for the purpose of enabling the officer, authority or body to perform
his or its functions under that law. Before RTI Act came, this is the
RTI-related law for IT assessees.
In addition
to this, the Chief Commissioner or Commissioner, on application of any person
in prescribed form for any information relating to any assessee received or
obtained by any I-T authority, if he is satisfied that it is in the public
interest so to do, furnish or cause to be furnished the information asked for
and his decision in this behalf shall be final and shall not be called in
question in any court of law.
The Central
government can issue a notification directly on what information could be
furnished by a public servant, notwithstanding anything contained in subsection
1 or any other law. For instance in 2014, it was notified that the DG of IT
(Systems), would give information about name, father’s name, residential
address of tax payer of particular state/union territory, for purposes of
implementation of National Food Security Act, 2013.
By
notification in 2013, the Joint Director and above serving in Directorate of
Enforcement, Department of Revenue, Ministry of Finance, Government of India,
who are performing functions under the Foreign Exchange Management Act, 1999
and the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002, are notified as specified
officers to disclose such information.
Similarly
specified officers notified are SP, Vigilance bureau, Jharkhand, Director,
Financial Intelligence Unit India (FIU-IND), Ministry of Finance, Joint
Director and above serving in Directorate of Enforcement, Department of
Revenue, Ministry of Finance.
Mr G, claimed
to be an informer to the income tax department, sought information and all the
records available with the income tax department in respect of several
assessees for various assessment years. He wants entire information about all
officers working in all wings of Income Tax Offices in Delhi, Central Delhi,
Chandigarh and Mumbai.
He first gave
civil list numbers of various officers, their location. He wanted all details
of 101 officers besides saying all officers from August 2003 to Sept 2005 or
all the officers from April 2005 to till the reply is given. Second page
contains his demand of information in soft form about assets statements of
persons listed by civil list number and designation, along with assets
statements of their spouse and person dependent on them for last ten years,
details of immoveable assets acquired by them in the last ten years along with
their sources. He also wants inspection of all records besides the designation
of officer whom the statement of assets and assets purchased are sent.
This is only
from one RTI application. He filed umpteen numbers of applications like this.
Assets-related information is claimed to be ‘third party information’ of
officers, their wives-related information was held to be their private
information. As per Section 6(2), the applicant need not give reasons for
demanding information.
But under
Section 8, the appellant has to inform the public interest, and under Section
11, the PIO has to examine whether there is any public interest in this demand.
Applicant being an ‘informer,’ he is interested in his incentive which is 10
per cent of recovered tax amount from tax evaders if based on information given
by the informer.
There are
instances ‘informer’ claimed crores of rupees as incentive which resulted in
capping of incentive at Rs 2.5 lakh in 2015. This appellant wanted entire files
of assets of 101 officers mentioned and hundreds of others.
If given,
anyone can open an office-cum-workshop, probe individual officers along with
their officers, assess tax evasion and give information about tax evasion to
the department so that he will earn his share. He claims that because he is a
citizen he has right to information for this purpose; he is serving nation’s
interest and hence there is public interest.
Reading this
RTI application itself is harassment and understanding its width and breadth
requires deep knowledge, a lot of time and to prepare the information sought
demands huge infrastructure. It is relevant to mention personal behaviour of
appellant.
He was in
hurry, intolerant, and unhesitatingly exhibited disrespect to the Bench of CIC
consisting of two Information Commissioners. He used intemperate language and attributed
bias to the Bench. After presenting his case for about 45 minutes, he blamed
the Bench for not hearing him and left, without answering questions asked. It is recorded that, earlier one learned IC
declined to hear his cases.
Considering
the information sought by the appellant as third party information, the Deputy
Commissioner of Income-tax issued separate notices under Section 11(2) of the
RTI Act to the assessees. The assessees submitted their objections and opposed
disclosure. The appellant has failed to substantiate the public interest if
any. The PIO, however, held that the Tax Evasion Petition is under compilation
and would be provided in due course.
Most
important factor to be noticed is that appellant is an “informer,” which means
he earns money at the rate of 10 per cent of the tax amount recovered from the
tax payers because of the information given. The question to be considered is
if he using RTI route to collect information and verify whether assessee has
suppressed income, and provides that information to the IT office. If his
tip-off results in recovery, he would get 10 per cent as incentive.
Can the RTI
be used to advance income interest of individual becoming ‘informer,’ or does
the ‘informer’ have right to such information that could fetch him income?
Appellant G contended that since incentive to reveal such income-related
information helps the State to enhance income, it is in public interest and
thus he can also seek the same.
How can
taking information from the I-T department, giving it back to the same office
and making money be considered as ‘public interest’? In fact, this speaks of the ‘system’ of the
I-T department or their efficiency. If their information could be analysed and
used for enhancing recovery by an individual outsider, why not the department
itself do that job? On this logic, it cannot be considered to be in public
interest.
When an
‘informer’ filed a writ petition claiming dues to be paid by the I-T
department, its DG of IT moved the Supreme Court stating that reward to be paid
for giving information about black money cannot be claimed as a matter of
right.
The income
tax department has brought out new guidelines to award secret informers
providing actionable clue about "untraceable" assesses who owe huge
taxes and money to government. The department issued in 2015 a set of new
instructions to all its offices in the country, stating any person who provides
credible inputs against a declared defaulter would be rewarded 10 per cent
booty of tax realised from such an entity, but up to a maximum limit of Rs 15
lakh.
The
informant, whose identity would be kept secret except in cases where law
requires, will just have to give inputs "supported by facts and
documents." The department has, at the same time, made it clear that no
"speculation, vague or inputs of general nature and educated guess"
will be entertained in this regard.
They have no
right to claim the ‘incentive’ for giving ‘the information.’ Can such an informer have RTI which can be
supplied back to IT department? This needs an elaborate consideration. (Based
on the order of CIC Division Bench of Mr Basanth Seth and Sridhar Acharyulu in
CIC/DS/A/2011/003603).
.JPG)
.JPG)
