Black Money- A Further Note

Further Note on the proposal about Black Money inside the Country

There has been some feed back on the note about Black Money circulated
among citizens.

It is said that the so called Black Money does not solidly exist in the hands of anybody in the country because such money is immediately converted to real estate, gold reserves, shares and undisclosed stock and trade by companies and traders, benami investments etc. Hence, lump sums of money cannot be expected to be deposited in the specialised banks.

This, of course, is a known fact. This is an ever increasing wealth of the corrupt persons. The high price of the real estate is in fact the evil result. This must somehow be checked to keep the prices within the reach of the middle class and force the wealth into the tax-net. This is possible by a nation-wide drive to investigate the holdings – wealth, acquired during the last ten or twelve years through the records of registration all over. This is a must for any government – a responsibility that cannot be evaded. Otherwise this evil will keep growing to dangerous proportions.

The Black Money that has gone into the real estate etc is obviously present in the country, if not in lump sums. This is bound to be present in smaller size among the upper classes. This would mean that the deposits if attracted into the special Banks, may be smaller ones. If not hundreds of crores, the deposits may be 1, 2, 5, 10 crores or millions. As the time progresses this is bound to accumulate very well. When proper check is introduced on heavy real estate transactions, the future deposits may gradually increase. Pressure applied at one end and relief at the other should work. Thus the money distributed in the country can be netted like small fish. If the offer of trouble-free deposits for a fixed time is available and not for all time, it is bound to work in this country. This will also gradually reduce the high price of the real estate besides eliminating fake currency, etc.

Recently in a TV interview with Dr Arun Shourie, the interviewer tried to convince that the money in Swiss and other Banks is not money from India but it is the deposits of NRIs. His sources of information are not known. But true, the Commissions from the foreign military hardware suppliers to the Indian agents or Indian politicians may have been directly deposited there without routing through India. Secondly, the names of the NRI depositors could have been benamis for the Indians. It is difficult to believe that NRIs earned so much money as to escape the foreign taxation and deposited the same in secret accounts. According to Swiss Bank reports of 2006, India’s deposits are 1456 Billion Dollars i.e. 72.8 Lakh crores of rupees. Even the direct foreign commissions, morally speaking, is Indian money.

In any case, the question is, is the government totally helpless to unearth the corruption money? Does it mean that the evil will go on perpetually and these political governments will turn a Nelson’s eye to this evil? At the cost of the crores of middle class people and the poverty-stricken people, does it not lead to a socio-economic unrest uncontrollable?

It is reasonable to believe that the foreign money would also flow into this country using the limited time facility.

These are the questions of an unqualified non-technical senior citizen who feels that these are issues seriously debatable among all knowledgeable citizens.