In September, speaking at a conference of tax officials, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had asked income-tax department to decrease human interface and increase use of technology so that there is less scope of corruption or extortion of money by rogue tax officials. The tax department has started working on this project and from the next year, tax-payers won't need to interact with any official or visit the tax department.The government is planning to roll out a pan-India "faceless and nameless" e-assessment procedure for income-tax payers from 2018. The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has constituted a high-level committee to prepare a quick road map for the implementation of this ambitious proposal. The CBDT has been running a pilot project in a few major cities to test the feasibility of implementing this new regime of tax assessment.The new step will eliminate corruption by removing human interaction which makes the assessment procedure more transparent.The new system will, however, be voluntary and taxpayers can choose whether to conduct their dealing over the e-system or through the existing procedure of manual submissions of documents by visiting the tax office, reports PTI. The functionality to conduct e-proceeding will be available for all types of notices, questionnaires and letters issued under various sections of the I-T Act, the CBDT had earlier said.Two weeks ago Bloomberg reported that the government planned to overhaul its tax assessment and investigation process for the nation’s top 500 companies as part of Modi’s endeavor to improve ease of doing business and curb corruption. The measure is likely to be introduced in the Budget in February.In case more information is sought, the company’s response will not end with the same set of officials as it will be determined by an algorithm, eliminating discretion, the Bloomberg reported. The new system will be location-agnostic as assessing officials will be chosen electronically, making their location irrelevant.