Old ways of doing business cannot continue, says Kiran Bedi

Former cop and social activist Kiran Bedi on Monday said that old ways of doing business cannot continue, and welcomed the NDA government's move to reveal names of persons parking their excessive funds in banks abroad.

"It is just a beginning. The larger message is that the way you were doing business earlier, it cannot be done any longer now. You have to pay tax now," Bedi said.

"You cannot take country's money abroad and, if you want to, then pay the tax first," she added.

She requested the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and income tax authorities to ask all to declare their sources of income and the tax paid on them.

"The government is fulfilling its promise. Because an FIR has been registered, it means that there are proofs against the names on the list," she added.

The Centre today revealed the names of three people having black money stashed abroad in its affidavit to the apex court.

Pradip Burman, former Director of Dabur group, Pankaj Chimanlal Lodhiya, a Rajkot based bullion trader and Radha S Timbola, a Goa based miner, reportedly feature in the much awaited list.

The three business persons have been charged under various sections of the Income Tax Act and Money Laundering Act.

The ruling BJP had raised the issue of black money during the campaigning for the 2014 Lok Sabha and repeatedly questioned the stand of the former Congress-led UPA regime.

The government is building pressure particularly on Switzerland, seeking details of Indians who have parked unaccounted for money in the Alpine country's highly secretive banks. It has quickly implemented a Supreme Court directive to set up a high-powered special investigation team, headed by retired judge MB Shah, to look into the issue.

While there are no official estimates, Global Financial Integrity (GFI), a Washington-based think-tank, has estimated that Indians had parked USD 462 billion in overseas tax havens between 1948 and 2008.

Earlier, the government had told the apex court that it could not disclose the names of those who have deposited money in banks abroad as it this would jeopardise tax agreements with nations providing those names to India.

There were murmurs of protest within the ruling BJP that not disclosing names would hurt the party's image after it had made bringing back black money, a key issue in a general election that it won by a landslide. The Centre's stand also drew a strong response from the Congress, which accused it of hypocrisy.

Turning the tables on the Congress, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had recently said the disclosing of names of people holding black money accounts will embarrass the opposition party.