14,000 properties, Rs 2.8 lakh crore in cash deposits under I-T lens

The Income Tax (I-T) Department on Thursday said that cash deposits worth Rs 2.89 lakh crore made by 9.72 lakh persons since demonetisation are under scanner. The deposits have been made in 13.33 lakh accounts, the I-T department added.The announcement comes a day after the annual report of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for the year 2016-17 revealed on Wednesday that 99 per cent of the old 500 and 1,000-rupee notes that were demonetised have come back into the banking system since the note ban in November last year.With over Rs 15 lakh crore of junked currency coming back into the banking system post the demonetisation, the government on Wednesday had said a "significant portion" of it could be black money "Objective of note ban was to bring down cash in economy, bring digitisation, expand tax base and fight black money," Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had said in a press conference on Wednesday after RBI published its report. "Money has now been identified with its owner," he added.Earlier in the day, speaking at a separate summit, the Finance Minister further said the fact that money got deposited in banks does not mean that all of it is legitimate money.The government had earlier said that the money trails generated as a result of demonetisation has resulted in identification of 2 lakh shell companies. It also claimed that the addition of 56 lakh new tax-payers was a result of demonetisation, which led to better compliance and better tax revenues.