India 'strong champion' for global tax transparency: OECD official

New Delhi, Dec 14 (PTI) India is a "strong champion" in implementing transparency measures against offshore tax evasion and its recent campaign asking taxpayers to correctly report their undisclosed foreign assets has led to disclosure of properties worth more than Rs 29,000 crore, a top OECD official has said.

Head of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Secretariat Zayda Manatta told PTI in an interview that these "notable" outcomes were a result of India's "commitment" to global tax transparency and automatic exchange of information standards.

Manatta was here recently for the OECD annual plenary meeting of the 'Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes' hosted by New Delhi between December 2 and 4.

The France headquartered OECD is a globally recognised body that works for economic and social policy promotion. The Global Forum had 172 countries as its members.

"India is a strong champion in tax transparency and has been supporting the work of the Global Forum since 2009.

"As demonstrated by the hosting of the 2025 Global Forum Plenary meeting in New Delhi, India is continuously supporting the work of the Global Forum and the fight against offshore tax evasion," Manatta told PTI in an email interview.

Asked about the OECD's expectations from India vis-a-vis the fight against offshore tax evasion, Manatta said India was "meeting its commitment and the requirements of the tax transparency and exchange of information standards." "Regarding automatic exchange of financial account information (Common Reporting Standard (CRS), India has the legal framework in place and is on track with respect to the implementation in practice," she said.

India, as per Manatta, has "benefitted" from the use of CRS data.

"India's Non-Intrusive Usage of Data to Guide and Enable (NUDGE) programme has delivered notable outcomes.

"...These include a 45.17 per cent increase in taxpayers reporting foreign assets, an additional INR 292 billion (approximately EUR 2.41 billion) in reported assets, and INR 1.09 billion (approximately EUR 104 million) in additional income," she said.

The OECD official was referring to the campaign initiated by the Income-Tax Department and its administrative body the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT), responsible for direct tax administration in the country.

The CBDT had launched the first NUDGE campaign in November, 2024 for taxpayers who had been reported by foreign jurisdictions under the Automatic Exchange of Information (AEOI) framework as holding foreign assets that were not disclosed in their Income Tax Returns (ITRs) for assessment year 2024-25.

The initiative, as per a CBDT statement, yielded in 24,678 taxpayers (including several not directly nudged) revisiting their ITRs and "disclosing" foreign assets worth Rs 29,208 crore, along with foreign-source income of Rs 1,089.88 crore.

A second such NUDGE campaign has been launched by the CBDT in November for AY 2025-26.

Manatta said the AEOI regime has brought "significant" benefits to member jurisdictions which includes the exchange of data on 171 million accounts (about 17.1 crore) worth EUR 13 trillion (about Rs 13 lakh crore) in 2024.

As the name suggests, under AEOI international tax authorities share data to reduce global tax evasion and increase transparency under a CRS.

Manatta said the global forum has "focused" on "broadening" the scope of international tax cooperation between countries and reinforcing compliance frameworks with a priority area being to extend the AEOI regime to "new asset classes" like crypto currency and enhancing standards to safeguard data integrity.

"The Global Forum continues to identify and monitor risks linked to new technologies in particular, that could affect the effective implementation of the tax transparency and exchange of information standards," she said.

Asked about the takeaways from the plenary that saw 400 participants from 115 jurisdictions and 10 international organisations, Mantta said the delegates "reaffirmed the principles of inclusiveness and equal footing as essential to combating tax evasion and promoting fairness." The top OECD official added that the body has advanced its work on the recently-developled crypto assets reporting framework (CARF) under which countries are expected to start exchanging data from 2027.

The next OECD Global Forum plenary is expected to held in Uganda during 2026. PTI NES DV DV