The man Behind the Successful Crackdown on Black Money Syndicate

Taking India a step closer towards making it a fully tax-compliant nation and unravelling the thick layers of the tax evasion circle, an Indian revenue Service officer, Dhruva Purari Singh, took upon himself the task of conducting a project based investigation under which he collected the database of money launderers, identified bogus companies and conducted a nationwide search to turn the “income Disclosure Scheme, 2016” into a grand success. While the nation was aware as to how Prime Minister Narendra Modi cracked a whip on tax defaulters, not many Indians knew about the intricacies of the undertaking by Dhruva Purari which makes it all the more pertinent to put him on the Cover Page of Bureaucracy Today.

- Ekta Kashyap

The Narendra Modi-led government launched an ambitious income Disclosure Scheme on June 1, 2016, to fulfil its commitment to uncover black money in India. under this scheme, which ended on September 30, the undisclosed income invested in any asset was to be declared and people could pay 45% tax on the declared amount. The plan was launched at an unprecedented level, and it took the form of a revolution against black money. in this connection, the role of IRS officer Dhruva Purari Singh, currently Deputy Director at the national academy of Direct Taxes, Nagpur, is worth highlighting. Dhruva rode atop a tiger, so to say, to help crack the black money syndicate involving shell companies and their dummy directors.

The seriousness with which the IRS officer executed this investigation created an atmosphere where people had a grave realization that if they failed to disclose their unreported income, this man would make sure that they faced stringent repercussions. no wonder, he had to face several impediments and was warned to repudiate from his investigation. in this regard the 2009-batch IRS officer says, “given that the names of top political leaders and businessmen were involved, i received a threat against which i had got an Fir registered”. However, that did not deter him from performing his duties with absolute integrity.

The saga of the voluntary income Tax Disclosure Scheme goes back to 1951. Since then, successive governments have announced such schemes every decade till the 1990s. however, the decennium of 2000-2010 saw no such scheme proclamation. The Black Money (undisclosed Foreign income and assets) and imposition of Tax (BMiT) act in 2015 and now the income Disclosure Scheme 2016 floated to the surface after a chasm of almost 18 years.