Discuss the role of Parliamentary Standing Committees in ensuring accountability of tax administration in India, with reference to recent scrutiny of the Income-tax Act, 2025.

Departmentally Related Standing Committees, created in 1993 as permanent panels of 21 Lok Sabha and 10 Rajya Sabha members, examine bills, budgetary outlays and implementation by ministries [1]. The Standing Committee on Finance's ongoing review of the Income-tax Act, 2025 shows how this oversight now reaches deep into tax administration, not merely tax legislation.

How committees enforce accountability in taxation

• Pre-legislative scrutiny: the Income-tax Bill, 2025 was examined by a parliamentary panel before passage, improving drafting of a law meant to achieve comprehensive simplification [2].
• Financial oversight: committees examine the Demands for Grants and expenditure plans of the Finance Ministry [1].
• Post-legislative review: they select subjects and summon officials — here, "Direct Tax Reforms: Simplification, Rationalisation and Ease of Compliance" with the Department of Revenue and CBDT [3].
• Depoliticised deliberation: work is cross-party and off the floor, so criticism came from members of both treasury and opposition benches [3].

The Income-tax Act, 2025 as a case study

• The Act took effect on 1 April 2026, replacing the 1961 Act; sections fell from 819 to 536, rules from 511 to 333 and forms from 399 to 190 [4].
• The Committee flagged "compliance glitches" five months into implementation and criticised excessive reliance on punitive provisions that widen official discretion [3].
• It demanded hard data from CBDT — revenue trends, number of assessees, pending litigation — turning oversight into evidence-based scrutiny rather than rhetoric [3].
• Net direct tax collections rose 23.09% to ₹8.11 lakh crore by 10 August 2026, prompting the panel to ask whether this reflects genuine buoyancy or aggressive enforcement [3].

Limitations

• Recommendations are persuasive, not binding [1]; Finance Bills are rarely referred; annual reconstitution and thin research support weaken continuity.

Standing Committees thus convert Parliament's episodic control over the purse into continuous, data-driven supervision of the tax bureaucracy. Strengthening them through action-taken reporting, dedicated research staff and routine referral of taxation measures would reconcile the State's power to tax under Article 265 with the taxpayer's right to fair, non-arbitrary procedure — the very balance the new Act promises.