Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in conversation, on the second day of BJP’s national executive meeting in Delhi on Saturday (PTI Photo) Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in conversation, on the second day of BJP’s national executive meeting in Delhi on Saturday (PTI Photo)

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley Wednesday stressed that India needs bold decisions and that time has come to clean up the table. In his address at the Vibrant Gujarat Summit in Gandhinagar, he said excessive paper currency has its own vices and leads to its own temptations.

Demonetisation “is going to have an impact over the course of our present and future lives,” said Jaitley. “Difficult decisions initially pass through difficult phases. Historic decisions have temporary pain attached to them.”

“After transient impact, demonetisation will lead to cleaner and larger GDP,” the finance minister added.

With regard to the Goods and Services Tax (GST), he said while most of the issues have been resolved, there are a few critical issues that still need to be addressed. He added that the impact of both GST and demonetisation will be felt this year.

More than two months after the government announced demonetisation with an aim to cut down on black money and end terrorist funding from counterfeit notes, estimates of alleged black money in the economy still remain unclear. The Tax Department has reportedly detected deposits of Rs 3-4 lakh crore of unaccounted income in over 60 lakh bank accounts during the 50-day window. A government official told PTI that the IT department has been asked to scrutinise details of the accounts and send notices to depositors for alleged tax evasion.

While the tax department has also found that Rs 25,000 crore cash was deposited in dormant bank accounts, nearly Rs 80,000 crore of loan-repayment was done in cash after the demonetisation decision of the government.

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