What’s in the news?

• Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently launched the “Transparent Taxation — Honouring the Honest” platform aimed at easing compliance and expediting refunds, benefiting honest taxpayers.
• Three main features of the platform are faceless assessment, faceless appeal and taxpayers’ charter.

Objectives

• The faceless assessment system seeks to eliminate corrupt practices by doing away with the territorial jurisdiction of income-tax offices. With the help of technology, the cases of scrutiny will now be allocated randomly to any official in any part of the country. The document identification numbers will be issued from the central database.
• Review of orders will also be done by another team at some other place, chosen randomly using data analytics and artificial intelligence.
• The platform would instil a sense of fairness and fearlessness in the taxpayers. 

Taxpayers’ charter

• The taxpayers’ charter outlines the rights and duties of an honest taxpayer. 
• It also defines the commitment of the tax department and the expectations from the taxpayers.
• Mr. Modi said taxpayers’ charter was also a vital step in the country’s development, in terms of bringing about a balance between the responsibilities and the taxpayers’ duties and also fixing the government’s responsibilities.
• He appealed to those not paying taxes despite the capability to come forward and commit themselves to the cause of making the country self-reliant.
• Although the taxpayer base had expanded by 2.5 crore in the past six-seven years, it was a matter of grave concern that only about 1.5 crore people were paying income-tax in a country of over 130-crore population. 

Reference:

1. https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/pm-says-faceless-assessment-faceless-appeal-and-taxpayer-charter-part-of-new-platform/article32342005.ece