Black money trail : Swiss ready to revise treaty

The Government has approached Swiss authorities to
renegotiate its Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement (DTAA), a tax treaty
between the two countries in force since 1995, to obtain details of bank
accounts maintained by Indians in Switzerland.

The Swiss Government has in the past refused to share bank
information pertaining to Indians with New Delhi on the ground that such
details were not necessary for application of the DTAA. Swiss authorities had
expressed inability to provide details, citing their own laws, since India’s
requests were related to enforcement of its internal tax laws.

India is part of the task force constituted by the G-20 at
its London summit to formulate a “global plan for recovery and reform which
promises to take action against non-cooperative jurisdictions, including tax
havens and also to deploy sanctions to protect public finances and financial
systems”. On alleged role of Swiss banks in the 2004 stock market crash, the
affidavit said that Securities and Exchange Board of India had in 2005 barred
Swiss financial institution UBS Asia from issuing and renewing any
participatory notes for a year. But this was following its refusal to disclose
information relating to an investigation carried out by SEBI, not for its role
in the market crash.

(Source : The Times of India, dated 04.05.2009)