India to align overseas tax info gathering system with OECD

The Finance Ministry has proposed to change the way it has been gathering such information, it said in an internal note.

The ministry, in the note, has suggested that the proforma for information gathering should be in sync with the one developed by OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development).

The OECD is a grouping of rich countries, including the US, Japan and from Europe.
Besides, the government wants to have a separate reporting system for obtaining any information relating to Transfer Pricing.

Transfer Pricing refers to cross-border transactions between related entities. However, there are complaints that the system has been misused and the government has detected mispricing to the tune of Rs 34,145 crore in the last two financial years.

Field officers of the Income Tax Department seek information from countries and jurisdictions with which India has Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement (DTAA) or Tax Information Exchange Agreement (TIEA) through authorised channels.

The ministry also directed that separate requests be made for different tax-payers even if the case pertains to the same country.

"Further, separate requests should be made for different countries even if the cases pertain to the same assessee," the note added.

The Government has adopted a five-pronged strategy to deal with the problem of black money, including negotiations and re-negotiations of tax agreements with various countries and entering into new ones.

India has completed negotiation with 56 countries and jurisdictions and negotiations with 28 are under progress.