Driven substantially by the higher education sector, real estate deals and mining income, India’s black economy could now be nearly three-quarters the size of its reported Gross Domestic Product (GDP). These are among the findings of a confidential report commissioned by the government and accessed exclusively by > The Hindu .

Since there were no “reliable” estimates of black money generated in India and held within and outside the country, the UPA government commissioned the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy (NIPFP) to estimate the black money in India and held overseas by Indians.

The Special Investigation Team on black money, constituted by the Narendra Modi government on May 27 in compliance with a Supreme Court directive, is studying the report.

Though the report was submitted to the Finance Ministry in December 2013, the UPA’s Finance Minister P. Chidambaram did not place it in Parliament. Nor has his successor Arun Jaitley done so.

The capitation fees collected by private colleges, on management quota seats in professional courses, last year was around Rs 5,953 crore, the report estimates.

( > This news article was first published in The Hindu )

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