S. Raghunatha Prabhu, Punnapra

Personal Income-tax should be abolished. It would have been abolished years ago if at least 25 % of our politicians, who declare only subsistance- level income, paid any income-tax. Income tax forms just 2 % of the government's revenue. It could be recovered through an expenditure tax. Abolition of Income-tax will solve many problems such as tax-evasion, black money, filing and keeping Income-tax returns besides keeping a large number of income-tax personnel. 2-G spectrum scam lost us Rs.1,76,000 crore. S-band spectrum caused us a loss of Rs.2,00,000 crore. There are huge sums of Indian black money in foreign tax havens. So the honest salaried class deserves total income-tax exemption. Moreover, it is not those who work, earn and invest and indirectly contribute to the society's well being who should be taxed. The government should tax those who consume and get benefits from the society .Expenditure tax will serve this purpose better than Income-tax. Interest on Bank deposits should be exempted from income-tax. It is the salaried class and lower middle-income groups who deposit money in banks. The wealthier class prefers stock market and realty. Interest on bank deposits is the only source of additional income for most of the the lower-income groups and retired persons.Exempting bank deposit interest from income-tax will be a great relief for the bank depositors and banks will be saved from the tedious task of TDS. Banks will attract more deposits.