Swiss banking details of Indians from today

New Delhi, August 31

Banking details of Indians with accounts in Switzerland will be available to tax authorities here from Sunday as the automatic exchange of information regime kicks off between the two countries.             

The move, the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) said, is a significant step in the government's fight against black money and the era of "Swiss bank secrecy" will finally be over from September.

The CBDT frames policy for the Income-Tax Department.  Between August 29 and August 30, a Swiss delegation, led by deputy head of the tax division in the state secretariat for international finance Nicolas Mario Luscher, called on Revenue Secretary AB Pandey, CBDT Chairman PC Mody and CBDT Member (Legislation) Akhilesh Ranjan before the regime kicked in, it said.  The first automatic exchange of financial account information (AEOI) under the provisions common reporting standard  will start from September.

"India will receive information of the calendar year 2018 in respect of all financial accounts held by Indian residents in Switzerland," the CBDT said in a statement.        

The information will include accounts that were closed during 2018.  During the meeting, both sides discussed bilateral exchange of information matters to expedite execution of tax information sharing requests made by India in specific cases, it said.

"Enhancing collaboration in offshore tax compliance matters was also discussed," the CBDT said. PTI