Sri Sri lauds PM Modi over demonetisation, terms him strong leader

Spiritual guru Sri Sri Ravi Shankar on Friday lauded Prime Minister Narendra Modi over demonetisation and termed him as a strong leader.

Talking to reporters here after attending Global Leadership programme, the spiritual guru said that after a long time the country has found a strong leader like Prime Minister Modi.

"There is no doubt that that after a long time, we have got a strong leader (Prime Minister Modi). The Prime Minister is taking significant steps, but there needs to be lots of improvement in the implementation (of those steps). There are lots of things that need to be done in the country."

On November 8, 2016, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced to demonetise 500 and 1000-rupee banknotes.

The spiritual guru, however, expressed hope that currently the businesses are down but will recover soon.

"Businesses are really down and not in good spirit but now spirit has to come up. I'm sure it will take to a better level. Though it's a crisis situation now; we hope things should get better," Sri Sri said.

On the first anniversary of demonetisation, the opposition parties observed November 8, 2017 as 'black day' across the country to oppose demonetisation, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) celebrated it as anti-black money day.

The government says it had been taking steps to curb the black money menace in the country.

On Thursday, the Enforcement Directorate said it has attached black money worth Rs. 9,000 crore post demonetisation.

According to the government data as on August 31, there was quantum jump in enforcement actions based on demonetisation data.

"There was 158 percent increase in searches from 447 to 1152 groups. Seizures increased from Rs. 712 crore to Rs. 1469 crore. There was an increase of 38 percent in admission of undisclosed income- from Rs.11,226 crore to Rs. 1,54,96 crore," said the government.

The Income Tax Department launched 'Operation Clean Money' (OCM) on January 31, 2017 to analyse the data of the persons who deposited large sums of cash and whose returns of income were not in sync with such deposits.

As per government data, 18 lakh suspect cases were identified through use of data analytics where cash transactions did not appear to be in line with the tax profile of depositors in the first phase of OCM.

The government also says that demonetisation has widened the tax-base.

"The number of e-returns of Individual taxpayers filed till 5th August, 2017 (due date of filing) increased to 2.79 crore from 2.22 crore returns filed during the corresponding period of last year, registering an increase of about 57 lakh returns (25.3%)," says the government.

According to the government, direct tax collections also registered quantum leap.