Bollywood: Tax evasion

Bollywood and the Income Tax Department have always shared an uneasy and fraught relationship. The two sides have rarely missed an opportunity to run the other down. Taking this legacy forward, the Income Tax Department has slapped 132 TV and movie production houses with notices, asking them to file their service tax returns immediately.

Among those targeted are bigges like Sunny Deol, Sameer Karnik, Anurag Kashyap and Tigmanshu Dhulia - at an individual level - and Eros International, Big Entertainment, Anil Kapoor Films Ltd, Red Eye and others - at the corporation level. On the one hand, where Bollywood actors like Akshay Kumar, Shah Rukh Khan, Katrina Kaif and others are known for paying advance taxes year after year, there are hundreds of others in the fraternity who try to evade taxes. Most of the producers and production houses were intimated officially about their pending liabilities towards the Income Tax Department almost a year ago, but they chose not to heed the notices. What is obnoxious is the fact that most of them are well-acclaimed producers and production houses. And a large number of those notified belong to the exclusive club in the Rs.100 crore plus revenue category.

While many of these people are fond of crowing from rooftops about the box office success of their films, they have clearly dithered in the matter of paying the State its dues. That is likely to besmirch the reputation of Bollywood. For many years the film industry was believed to be a haven of black money and illicit wealth untill its leading players started  making full disclosures of their incomes and paid taxes where it was due. That helped to reform the industry's image. But obfuscation on the part of some players could once again help to destroy its new-found clean image. That would be a travesty of everything that Bollywood aspires to stand for!