With doubts over official data on the number of taxpayers added post demonetisation, the Finance Ministry on Friday issued a long explanation stressing that there is no inconsistency in the statistics and said that 56 lakh additional Income tax returns were received in 2017.

This is the same figure quoted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his Independence Day speech, though there were other statistics in the second volume of the Economic Survey and earlier announced by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.

“The data maintained by the Income-Tax Department show that between April 1 and August 5 this year, 2.79 crore e-returns of Individual taxpayers were received as against 2.23 crore e-returns received during April 1,2016 to August 5, 2016,” said the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT). During the same period of 2015, 2.00 crore e-returns were received, meaning thereby, that in 2016, only 22 lakh (rounded off) additional e-returns were received by the due date of filing, it added.

“There is no inconsistency in the data provided by the government in the statements as these are in different contexts and for different time periods,” stressed the CBDT.

While the Prime Minister had said that 56 lakh new taxpayers e-filed income tax returns between April 1 to August 5, the Survey had said that 5.4 lakh new taxpayers were added post demonetisation.

“The growth of individual return-filers referred to in the Prime Minister’s speech is with respect to new and old taxpayers,” said the CBDT.

In contrast, the growth in the number of taxpayers in the Economic Survey is based on the number of new taxpayers assuming the previous year’s growth rate as the reference growth rate.

“The data used in Economic Survey are different from the data referred to in the Prime Minister’s speech in respect of the period of filing as well as the type of taxpayers and the two are not comparable,” it said.

Apart from this, there was more official data on taxpayers with different statistics. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had on May 17 said that 91 lakh taxpayers have been added to the tax net as a result of action taken by the Income-Tax Department.

Meanwhile, in reply to an unstarred question in Rajya Sabha on August 1, the government had said that 33 lakh new taxpayers have been added to the tax net post demonetisation.