Show us the money, say A R Rahman, Sania Mirza, Kamal Haasan

The tax department has decided to rope in film stars, sports personalities as well as a financial expert as brand ambassador s to promote the Income Disclosure Scheme which has seen few people coming clean in the initial few weeks. Sources said the government is launching regional campaigns, initially in Tamil and Telugu, to advocate the merits of the scheme meant to suck out black money from the system. It has identified actor Kamal Haasan, composer and singer A R Rehman, world's topranked doubles tennis player Sania Mirza, singer S P Balasubrahmanyam along with oncologist V Shantha and auditor T N Manoharan for an ad vertising campaign that is likely to be launched over the next few days.
In the coming weeks, a similar strategy could be adopted for other regions too, including the Hindi-speaking areas as well.


Already the financial po wers for publicity have been increased to promote the departments's two schemes-Income Declaration Scheme (IDS), and the ambitious Dispute Resolution Scheme.

So far, in several large cities the response has been in single digits as individuals are still consulting chartered accountants and seeking clarifications from the department.

IDS, which closes on September 30, provides immunity to those coming clean by paying 45% tax and penalty .Last year, the government's scheme to unearth black money overseas did not result in large disclosures, which is seen as another reason for he tax department to push the current one.

Some tax consultants have been advising clients that the payment, including penalty is high, and did not make sense. In addition, there are many who believe that they can get away with undisclosed income despite the government tapping more information, including information from overseas, to detect those stashing wealth illegally.

Tax officers indicated that they expected a pick up in the coming weeks as there is more clarity . Typically , such schemes are slow to take off with bunching of disclosures and payments as the deadline nears. In 1998, when the Voluntary Disclosure of Income Scheme (VDIS) was launched people queued up until midnight on the last day to avail of the benefit.